


Unshakeably Held

by Aelys_Althea



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Episode 4 Onwards, Fighting, Flashbacks, Friendship/Love, Gen, Growing Up, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Other, Pilots and Flying, The Garrison - Freeform, Undying Commitment, Variable Relationship - It's Up To You, Voltron Character Cameos, protecting, season 6
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-06-23
Updated: 2018-08-06
Packaged: 2019-05-27 13:33:00
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 7
Words: 25,665
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15025700
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Aelys_Althea/pseuds/Aelys_Althea
Summary: For Keith, it wasn't about friendship. It wasn't commitment to his captain. It wasn't duty, or responsibility, or guilt that drove him to chase down the Black Lion and bring Shiro back. It was so much more than that. It was a history, a long, long history, and everything that history entailed. It was a past and a significance that couldn't be described in mere words.Keith couldn't leave Shiro. No matter how hard Shiro pulled away, Keith would always hold onto him.





	1. Seeing Is Believing

The emptiness of the asteroid was almost eerie. It was monochromatic, the sand that spread seamlessly into rock a dull, listless grey. The only notable mar upon that sand, the only disruption in the jagged, broken mounds that could barely be deemed crags, was the ancient Altean ship discarded like a broken child's toy in the centre of the crater. The ship, and the footprints leading from it.

Keith followed those prints. He followed until he reached a mound punctured by the mouth of the cavern they disappeared into. It was dark within, a natural hollow sinking into the ground like a gaping throat with stalagmites for teeth and hanging stalactites protruding fangs that were made menacing in the greyish darkness within. The low hum of wind as it funnelled downward, darting like trailing ribbons through those mismatched teeth, was hauntingly ominous.

But not enough to pause in step. Not nearly enough to turn around and flee. Keith slowed only enough to grit his teeth, clench his fists, and take a slow breath as he peered into the cavernous depths. Then he stepped down the descending path in a route adjacent to Shiro's footprints.

_To Shiro_.

Wind's hollow moan was his only company. An ambient glow was all that broke up the darkness. Keith wasn't sure how long he walked for – minutes? An hour? – but it hardly mattered. He was following Shiro, was weaving through the endless lines of teeth that protruded from the gums of the cavern and jutted sporadically from the centre of the path as though a spearing trap frozen in time. Keith hardly noticed. The only thing present, the only thought of importance in his mind, was…

_Was Shiro._

When that ambiance faded into a violet hue, Keith finally slowed. His nerves were so taut that he could hear the thudding of his heartbeat in his ears. Shiro's footprints – they trekked surely and steadily onwards, and it took barely minutes of following the winding trail before the source of that familiar light faded into view.

A door. A door to a hangar? A door to a hangar and, beyond that, with barely a touch to nudge the heavy metal doors aside…

Gaping channels. Corridors, the picture of the inside of a ship's hull, and nauseatingly closeted for it. Walls of unbroken metallic fencing, and further corridors that diverged from the first, from the second. Keith stepped on silent feet throughout the labyrinthine depths, peering around corners but travelling unerringly onwards down and in and through an elevator system that hummed with too much smoothness for the apparent abandonment of the hanger. Shiro's footprints no longer led Keith onwards, but it didn't matter. Keith would look, would scour every inch of the violet-grey hangar, until he found –

_Shiro._

He didn't run. Keith was desperate, but he wasn't foolish enough to throw himself headlong into the moment that echoed with threat and malice. The sharp-edged metal walls, the emptiness, the isolation, and that ever-present light that pervaded it all – once, Keith might have been foolhardy enough to leap into the midst of potential disaster, but not anymore. Not when Shiro's safety was on the line.

When the labyrinth of passages finally cracked into open space and roofless platforms, the relief of the freedom from unnerving claustrophobia was far from calming. Not when Keith descended the ladder to a wide platform reminiscent of a bridge that stretched from the labyrinth's opening. Not as he edged down that bridge, eyeing the shelf-like walls that loomed on either side of him, the empty space of air and towering column of the hangar overhead.

Keith's footsteps echoed with each step, flicking his nerves with malicious fingers that bespoke _company_ and _threat._ He couldn't stop glancing around himself, not at the tower soaring above him but at the shelving, or more correctly what appeared to be upon those shelves. They looked like capsules. Capsules, or regeneration pods, maybe, that stood in stoic lines perfectly side-by-side. They were unremarkable, those capsules. Plain and unassuming. Yet somehow… somehow, even before Keith reached the end of the bridge-platform and slowed in step to really take a look at them, he knew.

_It's wrong. There's something wrong, something bad, something…_

The split, diverging atop a short flight of stairs at the end of the bridge, planted Keith directly before one such capsule. Pausing, sparing a moment to throw a glance over his shoulder, Keith raised his gaze towards the dark, unimposing glass wall of the capsule. If he peered keenly enough, he thought he could discern a shape within. A shape of… something. Someone? Instinctively, without deliberate intention, Keith's his hand rose. Sure and steady, far more than Keith himself felt, he reached towards the capsule and ran his fingers over the cool slickness of the front face. His breath seeped silently through his teeth, his heart thundering – only to catch in a gasp when the capsule flickered with violet, illuminating light.

Keith stared. He stared up at the pod, at the figure that was definitely someone within, and the empty spread of the hangar around him momentarily faded from thought. But only for a moment _– Shiro_ – for with barely a pause _– it can't be, it's_ – like a domino effect, the capsules alongside the first flared to life one by flickering one to reveal their own figures, still and silent and waiting within.

_Shiro…_

_Shiro was…_

_He was…_

So many. There was so many of him, identical figures propped upright and for all appearances asleep in their encapsulated isolation. Turning in place, eyes wide and unblinking, Keith watched each and every one of them burst into illumination as though actors subjected to the spotlight. Too starkly visible to be mistaken. Too consistent, and exact, and perfectly identical to be anything but. Keith's breath hitched, catching in his throat, until –

"Hello, Keith."

Keith spun in place. He saw him, planted at the ready, a smirk upon his lips and eyes flashing. His eyes… they weren't Shiro's eyes. Even across the stretching distance between them, Keith knew that much. Somehow, in all the impossibility of it, for all that the identical figures of him asleep in their capsules were _wrong_ , and _different_ , it was the Shiro who stood before Keith who seemed to most wrong of them all. The most alien and unreal. It was as though Keith was seeing him for the first time.

_Shiro… What the hell happened to you?_

* * *

 

"You're a smart kid. You'll do well."

"The tests have come back with expectations exceeded. This is very promising."

"So long as you put your head down and toe the line, you'll go far, kid."

How many times had Keith been told those very words in the past months? How many times, from the Garrison assessors, to his foster carers, to his teachers, had he been told that he 'could do this', that he was 'good at this', and that so long as he muffled any kind of autonomy and did what he was told he would 'go far'? Keith didn't know, couldn't have counted it. He'd never been counting in the first place, for that matter; all of it, every word, felt so utterly ludicrous.

Maybe he was smart. Maybe he did have the natural predisposition to be an incredible pilot, just as those assessor's tests had somehow discerned. And maybe he would go far if he learnt to quell the discontent of having his voice smothered, his wants overlooked, and any freedom to do what he wanted to stripped from him.

But it felt like too much to ask.

Life at the home wasn't conducive to doing what he was told. There were reprimands when he did something wrong, and at times the heavier handed of the carers took a belt to some of the unrulier kids. No one liked the belt, but it was known, expected, and by and large most with a grain of sense knew how far they could push the boundaries before that belt made an appearance.

Keith had learnt that long ago. It had taken barely weeks since he'd been shunted into 'care' to discover just what limits each and every carer demanded of him. Keith hadn't been struck in a long time, and he hadn't been scolded either. But that wasn't the same as being one of the favoured kids. Favour wasn't a part of it; it didn't come into play for kids like him. It was hard to care about following the rules and 'toeing the line' when those that set those rules and laid those lines ultimately only cared as far as it made their own lives easier.

For Keith, he knew of life before the home. Not many of the other kids remembered after they'd been in care for a couple of years, but he did. Memories of his father, of the self-reliance that his father had cultivated in him, the independence that made asking for help next to unthinkable, reared within him each and every time an order was laid.

"Do what you're told," they said. "Be in bed by eight o'clock or else," and "don't wander through town without supervision," as though he couldn't very well take care of himself.

Keith could. He could look after himself perfectly well. He didn't need anybody, and least of all the carers who didn't really care all that much.

The Garrison was no different. There was still school as he'd attended at the home, even if it was a little different. There was still assigned rooms, though he had to share with only one other boy rather than half a dozen. There were still adults with their rules, their demands, their scowls when he didn't contribute enthusiastically enough and their reprimands when he committed himself too greatly in the wrong places.

What did they want? _What more could they want?_ Keith didn't know, but after barely a handful of weeks at the Garrison he was growing so far past caring that it was next to impossible to pretend anymore.

Like in his mathematics class. The content wasn't difficult. It was barely even noteworthy for how little attention it required. Keith hadn't looked to the screen at the front of the room, hadn't listened to the teacher standing before it and explaining with too many unnecessary words, since the first few minutes that class had started.

And no one cared. Keith did his homework, passed his exams with bland success that drew frowns and mutters from his classmates, and so long as he didn't cause upheaval while doing so, no one cared. Why would they?

With his elbow propped on his desk, chin resting atop his palm and staring absently out the window, Keith suspected that the teacher knew he wasn't listening, but he didn't pull him up for his disregard. None of his classmates nudged him to attend either as he'd seen them do to one another. He didn't have friends, exactly. Not in his classes. Enemies, maybe, and rivals, but only because some idiots didn't have the good sense to leave him alone. It wasn't like Keith sought fights. He simply didn't avoid them when they planted themselves in his face – which, admittedly, they did remarkably often.

Kids were jerks.

Staring out the window, out across the ruddy brown spread of the plains beyond, Keith detachedly counted the minutes. It was a habit he'd gotten into long before it had been encouraged by the Garrison teachers. 'It's good for the mind', he was told, and 'good for time-sensitive missions'. Keith didn't know about that, but it certainly made it easier to know when his classes were finished. Someone had the poor sense to remove all clocks from the classroom to avoid the distraction that arose when class approached its final minutes. Keith was sure it was annoying not to know for people who didn't just count in their heads all the time – which apparently most of his classmates weren't capable of. Really, was it so hard?

As it was, he knew that the math class reached its final minutes when the teacher cleared his throat overloudly and called for the renewed attention of his students. "If you'll all put your tablets and pens down, I have an announcement to make."

Keith didn't look up.

"I'm very excited to introduce you to one of your senior upperclassmen who has taken it upon himself to assist in mentoring you all."

Keith blinked absently. He could just make out a ship bulky and awkward enough to be a corvette rise in the distance in a rush of sandy smoke.

"If you'll all join me in welcoming Shirogane Takashi to the room – I'd like you all to make him feel welcome and to do your best to benefit from the mentoring he can offer."

Applause sounded throughout the room, more excitable than Keith would have suspected at the offer of a mentor. But the whispers that hissed throughout the room, whispers of "him? We've got _him?_ " and "this is so cool!", was enough to suggest that Shirogane was someone of relevance. Someone that Keith wasn't sure he knew, thought might be vaguely familiar for his name and some kind of reputation attached to it. Not enough to warrant particular regard, however.

"Thank you, Mr. Connell," a new voice said, and the applause and whispers immediately ceased. "Hey, everyone. It's really nice to meet you all. Please, feel free to call me Shiro."

The corvette was making a mess of its take off. Keith nearly snorted as he watched the pilot visibly wobble in the air before making a tentative turn. He'd never even flown a corvette himself, but Keith was sure he could do better. It couldn't be that hard.

He was only detachedly aware that, throughout the room, whispers had erupted again. That the teacher had called for attention that wasn't obtained and suggested that anyone who had any questions for Shirogane could either raise their hand or approach him directly after the class. Something about biweekly visits to the class, about a timetable with availability that Shirogane could offer to everyone if they were interested, about how he would be "delighted to help anyone who's having any difficulty".

It wasn't relevant. Not to Keith. He wouldn't approach Shirogane, let alone speak to him. What was the point? Not only did the continued whispers and mounting excitement of his classmates suggest that the mentor would most likely be overwhelmed by admirers the moment the bell sounded, but he didn't want the help. Keith didn't listen as Shirogane continued on a short spiel about classes and struggles that he'd faced himself, and how he knew how tough first year could be "'cause it's a bit of a change from public education". Keith didn't glance towards him once.

And, just as predicted, as soon as the bell chimed throughout the room in an echo of its neutral buzz, there was a roiling flux of motion as each and every student lurched to their feet. Chairs scraped and shoes scuffled as they rushed to the front of the room in a veritable charge. It was so predictable – and more than a little pathetic – that Keith really did snort this time, rolling his eyes as he watched the corvette disappear into a tiny dot on the horizon.

Lifting his chin from his hand, Keith straightened in his chair. He cast a quick glance around the room, noted the relative clearness of the route to the door that for once wouldn't necessitate elbowing his way through people who didn't understand how annoying it was to be stuck behind slow walkers, and rose to his feet. To the sound of animated chatter, outbursts of delight and laughter, and Mr. Connell's ineffective attempts to calm the clamouring mass of eager kids vying for Shirogane's attention, Keith slung his untouched bag of books over his shoulder and started from the room.

Only to be stopped in the doorway by a raised voice and the sound of his name. "You're Keith Kogane, right?"

Pausing, Keith stared for a moment into the gradually flooding hallway of chattering students. He flicked his thumb on the strap of his bag, contemplated continuing without comment for a second, before slowly turning towards the front of the room.

At any other time, the sight of the majority of his class utterly silent and turned with unblinking gazes like sheep staring down a wolf would have been comical. This time it wasn't; not when Keith was the wolf. He spared the frowns, the almost glares, and the confusion upon every face a flat stare in reply, an unvoiced "what are you looking at?" before flicking his attention towards Shirogane.

He was a senior that Keith supposed he might have seen before. Tall, filled out in his black uniform as many of the seniors were from their hours at the gym to get in military shape, he might have even been imposing if not for the comfortable, affable smile upon his face. His eyes were friendly, his crew cut softened by the tuft of a fringe, and he seemed nothing if not approachable.

Not that Keith approached him. Not even when Shirogane nodded his head in easy greeting. He stood in the doorway and blinked at the new mentor in what most people understood instantly as an unspoken request to be left alone.

Clearly, Shirogane chose not to understand it that way. "You're Keith, aren't you?" he asked again, smile widening. "I've heard a lot about you. My year-mates got a chance to see your first aircraft simulation results."

Keith blinked.

"You're pretty impressive."

Keith adjusted his hold upon the strap of his bag, deliberately ignoring the redoubled glares of his own classmates.

"It's not likely that you need it at the moment, but if you ever wanted a hand with anything, I'm more than happy to offer it, okay?"

Keith didn't nod. He didn't even consider opening his mouth to reply. Once, his father might have chided him for his surliness and urged him towards friendliness, but those times had passed. In the years since he'd lost his father, his carers hadn't quite driven any lingering instinct to do so from him, but they certainly hadn't fostered it. Whether it was habit or simply who Keith was, he didn't know, but he didn't care enough for politeness to bother replying to Shirogane's friendly offer. Not even when Mr. Connell affixed him with a pointed stare that clearly told him to mind his manners.

Turning from the room and his class, Keith stepped into the corridor and the sea of older students who had already detached themselves from their classrooms. He didn't look back as he wove his way through bodies, and he barely thought about his class mentor again that day. It was the first time he saw Shiro and he couldn't have cared less.


	2. A Hand To Hold

He pleaded. "Shiro, it's going to be okay."

"Yes. It is."

He all but begged. "We just have to get back to the castle."

"We… are not going anywhere."

Keith didn't get the chance to struggle further. He didn't have a second to reattempt his appeal, because Shiro was charging at him with great, leaping strides that ate the distance between them in moments. He had the barest second to snap his shield to life before Shiro collided into him, his fist swinging, his weight smacking and throwing Keith backwards into a tumble, into a backwards leap, into the capsule behind him.

It was all he had time for. Keith grunted, his shield shattering and dissipating, before instinct took over and he threw himself sideways in the face of Shiro's fist swinging towards him.

Shiro didn't slow at his dodge. With the speed and agility that Keith had known him for, that he'd fought alongside and fought against countless times if only in training, Shiro was leaping after him. His fist swing again, streaking in a flare of the vibrant pink light it emitted and leaving a vivid afterglow burning into Keith's eyes. He ducked. He dodged again. He caught the blows he couldn't avoid with the gauntlets of his suit, and the force behind them nearly threw him backwards again each time.

Again.

And again.

And again, in a flurry of strikes that were too fast to follow, too fast to do anything more than react to.

Throughout it all, Shiro's eyes flared with that alien light, and Keith was wrought with desperate horror that somehow pervaded his reflexive evasions. It was that light, that horror, that slowed him enough to take the blow that collided with his chest and threw him over the edge of the bridge.

The fall was a blur. Twisting, tumbling, the platform beneath Keith approached at a speed that promised a smacking collision. He righted himself just in time to throw his thrusters into gear to catch him. Not enough that it didn't hurt when he landed. Not enough that, when his feet slammed into the platform, the impact resounding with a metallic thud, he didn't nearly collapse to his knees, gasping as volts of pain shot through his heels, his ankles, his calves.

Only for a second, though. Keith could only allow himself to feel the jarring pain for a fraction of a second before Shiro was upon him. Leaping from the bridge right after Keith, not even slowing in his attack, Shiro shot straight for him. His eyes flared, his fist swinging in violet ferocity, and Keith threw himself down the steps from the platform in a flying leap that left his breath torn from his chest.

The _BOOM_ of the impact that followed… It was terrifying in the promise of its force. Terrifying that a metallic arm could create such an explosive eruption. That it had come from Shiro, that Shiro had attacked, had struck with the intent to kill…

Spinning at the base of the steps, panting heavily with his heartbeat thundering, Keith drew his dagger from its sheath. He watched as, through the pluming outburst of smoke, the eruption from Shiro's impacted landing, dissipated enough to silhouette and then reveal him striding towards the edge of the platform. Keith's teeth clenched, a flick of his wrist extending his blade with a smooth _snick_. In retaliation, face hardened, Shiro raised his own arm still glowing and smoking from the impact of his punch, and a violet sword fizzled into conjugation from the back of his wrist. There was no care, no mercy or kindness, in his flat stare.

 _Shiro._ Keith almost hissed, because it wasn't right. It wasn't him. _What did they do_ _to you?_

He didn't ask. He hadn't the time to. Without forewarning, Shiro launched himself at him and, in a sweeping flourish of his conjured sword, he attacked.

It was a fierce battle. A mindless battle. The exchange of blows that held none of the consideration that 'exchange' entailed was too fast for thought. Keith dodged and blocked. He swung to disarm and sprang backwards when his attempt failed. In retaliation, Shiro struck – again, and again, and again – and there were no provisions for the disjointed plane of their attack. No slowing to allow for steady steps down the stairs of the multi-levelled platform as Shiro chased Keith along the brig, no momentary pause for recovery as he was forced backwards into the railing, his breath blown from him time and again. Keith simply struggled through the ensuing moments in a fit of rendered breathless.

Down another flight of stairs, sparks of violet light flying from their clashing strikes. Keith was driven into a corner, barely dodged out of it, and took another strike with the flat of his blade. A swipe, a thrust, a block – Shiro's sword swept towards him, and with a deflecting slash, Keith dodged around it to swing a fist at Shiro instead.

He missed. Shiro didn't.

The retaliating blow caught Keith under his chin in a reverberating smack. His helmet was flung loose, but Keith hardly noticed. Blood flooded his mouth, but he barely noticed that, either. Swallowing the metallic burst, abandoning thought of catching his breath again, he rolled away from Shiro's strike, darted along the railing, and spun towards him to take another strike.

He was too slow. Again. Shiro wasn't any gentler when he crashed into him with enough force to send them flying over the railing end over end.

Keith hurt. He hurt in more than just the places he'd been struck, the punches that had pounded his gut, the sting of his tongue from where his teeth had pierced it. He hurt in more than just his arm that had deflected blow after blow. The weight in his chest, aching and heavy, sobbed as he fell, struggling from Shiro's hold that was as far from the familiar embraces they'd exchanged in the past as possible. He hurt, and it hurt even more when, as they were flung into a strung cable that snapped beneath their weight, Keith kicked himself away from Shiro. He sent him flying backwards to tumble like a flung doll across the hangar floor a level below.

Clinging to his own swinging end of the cable, Keith soared in a frantic whirl. _Enough_ , he thought desperately, fiercely, the single word burning more than he could have imagined and sending the weight in his chest into enraged sobs once more. _I can't… I can't go easy anymore…_

Keith flew at Shiro. With the broken cable his rope, he soared across the gap between platoforms, arcing towards Shiro feet first and swinging with a double-footed push kick. The force was enough to send Shiro flying once more, crashing through the railing of the platform he'd landed upon and further backwards to the wide level below. Keith sprang after him, a cry of pain as much as rage torn from him, and with a _strike,_ a _swipe_ , a _connecting blow_ , he forced Shiro back.

Again.

And again.

And again, until the echoing clatter of blades resounding in a final, crashing block.

Keith panted heavily, every ounce of force he could muster pinning Shiro to the railing upon which he'd driven him into. His arms trembled, but Shiro's did too. The battle, of resistance and defence, as fierce as their chase had been.

Fury. Rage. Hatred, even. Keith hurt, because this wasn't _his_ Shiro, and he wanted that part of it gone. He wanted it fixed and ended. Sparks flew from the point of their blades' connection, and Keith growled with the effort of pushing the clone who wasn't wholly, couldn't possibly be Shiro back further, further, _further_ -

"That's the Keith I remember."

Keith's breath caught. For a split second, the trembling force of his strike faltered. For just that moment, the rage withdrew, and a rush of memories flooded forth to take its place.

_Shiro…_

Shiro took it. He took that pause and he used it. With a twisting wrench, he tore their stalemate apart, and then it was all Keith could do to keep himself afloat in the flurry of blows that rained upon him once more.

* * *

A fist caught him on the chin, throwing his head back and snapping his neck painfully. Keith staggered backwards a step, but even as his head swam with dizziness and his vision momentary blacked, he launched himself at the boy who had just struck him. His own fist drew back, feinted, and curled upwards in a fierce uppercut.

A satisfying "oomph!" met his ears, and Keith instinctively leapt backwards again and aside as he blinked rapidly to clear the blurriness of his vision. It was admittedly less of a jump and more of a stagger. Struggling to straighten, he planted his feet wide, raised his fists in a guarding stance, and readied himself for the next attack to strike.

Three on one wasn't fair, but then no one ever said that schoolyard brawls were supposed to be fair. That two of those three boys were bigger than Keith wasn't fair either, but he didn't expect any of them to go easy on him. To expect as much was to sign himself up for defeat. Whether he faced an adult twice his size or another child half his age, if they attacked him first, he would retaliate with full-force and full expectation of imminent threat.

The three boys – Olaf, Pedro, and Dean – staggered around him in a loose circle, at a distance not retreated but enough to avoid the darting attacks of close proximity. The shadows of evening stretching across the ground, the Garrison building and the back shed that was far too big to be a shed in Keith's experience, mixed with those of the boys but did little to hide the bruises on cheek and forehead and jaw that were rapidly blossoming. Nor did it hide the blood dripping from Pedro's nose, or the black eye already swelling Olaf's.

Keith knew he wasn't much better, but he didn't care. He was used to it, and not only because he'd gotten into countless fight at the foster home, and even some when he'd still lived with his father. Fights seemed to find him, and he would be a fool to let every passing blow debilitate him into being incapable of properly retaliating.

 _You can't rely on anyone_ , he'd taught himself years before. _That's why you've gotta do it yourself. You can't expect anyone to step up and protect you._

Dean spat what could have been blood or might have even been a tooth onto the ground at his feet. His uniform was mussed, but it was the glare he affixed Keith with that held Keith's attention. That, and his edging around behind him, as though he thought that such a movement was subtle.

"Think you're so tough," Dean grumbled. "Just 'cause you know how to hit."

Keith eyed him, scowling but otherwise unresponsive. _I'm not tough. You're just stupid._

"Just 'cause you're fast," Olaf added, edging sideways slightly to offset Dean's placement.

_It's not because I'm fast. I'm just faster than you._

"You know," Pedro said, sniffing as he took a swipe at his bloody nose and wincing as he did so. That wince faded into a glare as he refocused his gaze onto Keith. "You're gonna regret being all high and mighty in a few year's time."

Keith didn't respond. He didn't lower his defensive fists. He couldn't risk leaving an opening, because for all their unskilled attacks, the three boys would notice it. They were being taught to do just that in their self-defence classes, after all. That was the crux of the matter. Keith had been caught up in fights before, but they were growing only more frequent as noses remained out of joint with his ostracism and their developing skills.

It sucked, but Keith couldn't do anything about it. He'd just stand up for himself as he always did.

Drawing a slow, deep breath, Keith shifted his stance. His face hurt from the blow it had taken, both that which had clipped his chin and Olaf's from earlier that had caught him on the cheek and sent him staggering. His ribs twinged from a hook punch that still hurt despite its sloppiness, and his fists were skinned from punches of his own.

But he could handle it. He could. He would.

Dean darted forward from behind him. Keith caught the movement from his periphery. He spun towards him, dropped to a knee, and caught Dean in the gut with a fist. An instant later and Olaf leapt forwards, Pedro a second later, and Keith was springing to his feet to block, to dodge, to strike back with a quick jab-cross that smashed into Pedro's nose once more and sent him reeling back with a gurgling yelp. Not before Olaf flung an arm around Keith's neck, however. Not before he threw his whole weight onto Keith from above, leaning upon his back locking him in place as he forced him down. His choking hold all but completely cut off Keith's airways.

He gasped. He struggled and sunk his fingernails into Olaf's arm, tearing the skin. Olaf cursed, his arm trembling, but he only squeezed tighter. Bent double, Keith could only stutter for breath, staggering as Olaf bent him further and constricted his arm more and more like the unrelenting coil of a constricting python.

Tighter. Tighter. Sparks danced across Keith's eyes as he squeezed them shut, struggling to twist and writhe and claw, but to no avail. He flailed an arm sideways, fought to wedge the other into Olaf's side and spear it up into his kidney, but he couldn't – he couldn't quite –

"What's going on here?"

Keith collapsed. As Olaf abruptly released him, he crumpled to his knees and drew in a ragged, wheezing breath. It deteriorated into coughs and splutters instantly, but Keith didn't slow in rolling away from Olaf, scrambling across the dirt and into a defensive crouch. Only when he had eyes on the other three boys did he allow himself to raise a hand to his throat and focus on the trial of breathing.

But boys weren't looking at him. They weren't looming, a threat awaiting to strike when the interruption had passed. It didn't take more than a split second for Keith to drag his attention towards where they'd already focused their own. White faced, edging backwards with their fists abruptly tucked awkwardly behind them, they stared wide-eyed at Shirogane where he stood just on the edge of the main Garrison building.

The main building was a labyrinthine network with enough turns and sectors that the fragments of grounds between were easily overlooked in passing. Beside the shed where Keith had been chased by Olaf, Pedro, and Dean, the shed that was as tucked away as any other. But somehow, Shirogane had found it.

The friendly, amiable mentor of Keith's class… Standing in the doorway of the main building, he suddenly didn't look so friendly.

Keith hunched his shoulders, edging backwards even further as he kneaded his throat with palpating fingers. He watched, eyes darting between his three classmates and Shirogane. His expression was stern, unsmiling, and the square line of his jaw was made sharper by its visible tightness.

"I said," he repeated, eyeing them each in term as he slowly folded his arms over his chest, "what's going on here?"

Olaf and Pedro exchanged a glance. Dean shuffled from foot to foot. Keith sniffed, coughed once more, and all but ignored the lot of them. Even in the seconds since Olaf had released him, since Shirogane had interrupted them, Keith's taut nerves and pumping adrenaline had whirled down to next to nothing as though pushed from a drop-off. He knew he didn't have anything to worry about anymore. There was a point, he'd realised long ago, when kids and even some adults reined themselves in. A point and a presence of authority whereby they would no longer continue to fight but would instead withdraw into the subjugated, apologetic cowards that they were.

 _I'd never do that_ , Keith thought with another muffled cough. _If I ever had to start a fight, it doesn't matter who was watching. I'd finish it to the last punch._

"It's…" Olaf finally spoke up, breaking the ringing silence that met Shirogane's words. He audibly swallowed. "It's nothing, Shiro."

Shirogane's expression didn't flicker. He didn't even glance towards Keith but instead saved his not-quite glare for the three boys in a clear accusation, an indication of disbelief. It was satisfying to see, Keith thought. At least Shirogane wasn't an idiot; a whole lot of adults took one look at the situation, saw that Keith was involved, and instantly assumed he'd been the one to start the fight. Granted, he didn't usually avoid one should it arise, but Keith hadn't started a fight in a good long while.

"It didn't look like nothing," Shirogane finally said.

"It was…" Pedro's voice stuttered and broke, piping several octaves higher than usual as he cast a glance towards Keith. "We were just practicing, Shiro. It was just practice."

"Yeah," Dean agreed, edging forwards between his friends and nodding fervently. "We were only practicing a bit. Our defence instructor – Miss Matthews, she said it was good to practice –"

"In a safe environment," Shiro interrupted, his voice snapping like the crack of stone on stone. Dean almost cheeped as he was silenced. "In a safe environment, with supervisors and instructors to make sure no one gets hurt."

More shifting between feet. Keith wiped absently at his chin, swiped a thumb over his lip that he hadn't even realise had been split, and settled back from his crouch onto his haunches. He set about systematically deducing if he was injured enough to necessitate a visit to the Garrison nurse. He didn't think any of his teeth were knocked loose, which was good, but his ribs really did hurt. Each breath tugged at them painfully, so they were probably bruised.

"We didn't mean for it to get so – so far," Pedro stuttered, scrubbing furiously at his upper lip and only managing to make more of a mess of the blood still smeared there. "Really, Shiro, we didn't mean –"

"Yeah, it was just for fun," Olaf interrupted him. "Just for fun, and we didn't mean to hurt anyone."

His ribs were unlikely to be broken, Keith thought. Olaf hadn't the skill to manage that when Keith had half dodged out of his way. But it still hurt. He pressed absently along the swelling bruise, barely listening to his classmates' excuses.

"It was sort of an accident, actually –"

"Yeah, just an accident."

"- and it wasn't like we wouldn't have stopped –"

"We would have. Promise, Shiro, we would have stopped before anything… before anything happened."

Was it bad enough to see the nurse? Keith frowned down at his chest, kneading his fingers a little more firmly and frown deepening with the pressure. Probably not. Maybe he could give it a few days to see –

"Before anything happened? It looked like it was already happening. Choking someone in a headlock like that can be really dangerous."

\- and then decide if it was necessary. Keith wasn't above ignoring a little bit of bruising, but it would be annoying if disregard made it take longer to heal. It would probably start to hurt more down the track, too –

"Sorry! I'm sorry!"

"Yeah, we're really sorry, Shiro. We – we made a mistake 'cause we thought that –"

"It was just for fun. Right, Keith?"

At his name, Keith glanced up. He met the stares of each of the boys, each turned towards him intently with eyes meaningfully widened. He regarded each of them in turn, saw the guilt and fear spreading across each face, and couldn't help but snort, shaking his head.

"Whatever," he muttered, and returned to his assessment.

Shirogane chewed them out after that. Not like a teacher would; not with fierce reprimands and blatant threats of punishment for a repeat performance. Words like "it's really disappointing to see" and "as future pilots, I would have thought you guys would know better" were used instead, and from the way the three boys cringed and shuffled in place, Keith thought that maybe Shirogane's approach was better. It was kind of funny, really. If Keith wasn't becoming increasingly aware of just everywhere he'd been hit that he'd previously overlooked in the heat of the fight, he might have even laughed.

Eventually, however, the boys scampered away. Shirogane's firm warning chased after them. "Don't let me hear of it happening again. I'm going to have to report it to Discipline, but it would be a real shame if you guys would up in this situation again, wouldn't it?"

The boys fled with vigorous nods of their heads. They didn't even attempt to plead with Shirogane for mercy, or to lighten the tale that would be told to the Discipline Head. If anything, as Keith watched them throw a final glance over each of their shoulders before disappearing inside, he thought they might have even been grateful. How did Shirogane do that?

"Are you alright?"

Flickering his attention from the door up to Shirogane, Keith shrugged slowly. "It's whatever."

"It didn't look like whatever." Shirogane's arms dropped from their stout fold over his chest as he strode across the distance between them. He squatted down before Keith, and Keith didn't even bother to hide that he instinctively drew away from him. "Do I need to take you to the nurse's office?"

"You don't have to take me anywhere," Keith grumbled, though he felt more like a cornered wolf than one aggressively attacking. He didn't like it when people noticed he was in a fix. "I'm fine."

"Really?" Shirogane cocked his head, his face softening a little. It was strange how it did that; Keith couldn't pinpoint one feature in particular that shifted, but he seemed abruptly far less angry, far less disappointed. "You don't need to hide it, Keith. It probably sounds a bit pompous to say, but I'm your class mentor. That means I'm here to help you in every aspect of school that I can. Even the stuff outside of the classroom."

He was right; it did sound pompous. Keith's eyebrow twitched. "I'm fine, Shirogane," he said, curtly. Then, because it felt right and might actually help to get him to go away, "Thanks anyway."

Shiro frowned slightly, but it cleared almost instantly into a small smile. "You're welcome. And please, call be Shiro."

Keith opened his mouth to reply, closed it again, and pursed his lips. He shrugged once more. "Whatever."

"Does this sort of thing happen often?"

"What sort of thing?" Keith asked, swiping his thumb over his bottom lip again. At Shiro's pointedly raised eyebrows, he relented with a roll of his eyes. "Fine. What, those guys?"

"Those guys in particular," Shiro said with a nod. "Or anyone else."

"So what if it does?"

"Do you like getting into fights?"

Keith snorted. "Fights like getting me."

"So you don't like them?"

"I didn't say that."

Shiro's lips quivered slightly before his expression smoothed. "You know, you're a bit infamous in the senior classes," he said mildly, settling backwards onto his rump and crossing his legs before him. His hands draped casually over his knees. "We all saw your first simulation."

"I know," Keith said, edging backwards slightly before mirroring Shiro's seat. He was under no allusions that Shiro would let him get up and leave until he was finished with him. "You told me."

"Last week, you mean?"

Keith nodded.

Shiro smiled. "I wasn't sure if you remembered. You didn't seem all that keen to stay and chat."

Keith lowered his chin, dropping his gaze to his boots. He resisted the urge to rub his ribs once more, plucking at his laces instead. "You seemed like you had a big enough group of admirers. Why should I join in?"

"Admirers?" Shiro chuckled.

"Well, aren't they?"

Shiro reached a hand to scrub awkwardly at the back of his head. "I guess so? It sounds embarrassing if you say it like that."

"Doesn't make it any less true."

"Does that annoy you?"

Keith glanced up with just his eyes. "What? That you've got admirers?" At Shiro's nod, he frowned. "No. Why would I care?"

Shiro's hand dropped slowly from the back of his head, sliding down to clasp the back of his neck for a moment before flopping into his lap. "No reason, I guess. I suppose I might have just thought that was why you didn't want to approach me for help."

"I don't need help," Keith said shortly. "My grades are fine."

"You don't need help with anything at all?" Shiro asked, a curious lilt to his tone.

"No."

"Not even with the kids who are supposed to be your friends?"

"I don't have friends."

The words slipped out before Keith could smother them, and he winced as Shiro's eyebrows snapped upwards, his blinks fluttering rapidly. It wasn't because it was necessarily untrue – Keith didn't have friends, after all – but to admit it to his class mentor was a little embarrassing. And unnecessary. And would likely provoke interference.

Keith almost expected pity. Or sympathy, maybe, as seemed more suitable of Shiro. But as Shiro visibly composed himself, he only smiled affably and cocked his head once more. "Would you like them?"

Keith blinked. "Would I… what?"

"Because I'd be more than happy to be your friend," Shiro continued, smile widening. "When I was your age, there was no one else who was quite as good at flying as me." He chuckled a little bashfully. "And that's not as arrogant as it sounds. Or maybe it is, but it's true. It kind of sucked, to be honest."

Frowning, Keith stared Shiro dubiously. He didn't reply as Shiro visibly paused for response before continuing. "So I just thought, if you'd like… Well, maybe you'd like to come on down to the Garrison hangar some time to have a bit of a look around? You can't go down without a supervisor or a senior with a pass – which is me." He chuckled again. "What do you think?"

Keith's frown deepened. What did he think? He thought Shiro was weird, for one; who invited a stranger down to a secure location at the drop of a hat? "I…"

"You like flying, don't you? You seemed to, from what I saw."

Liked it? Keith pursed his lips once more. He didn't know how much 'liking' had to do with it, but he supposed it was sort of fun. The most fun of just about anything he'd ever done. And ships were interesting; even more interesting the more he learnt of them. And he didn't simply have 'a knack' for obtaining such knowledge, either, which made it even more interesting. He had to learn it, because that kind of knowledge? It didn't just come naturally.

Drawing his lips to the side, Keith darted his gaze up to Shiro once more. "I guess," he said slowly.

"It can just be the two of us, if you'd like," Shiro said casually. "As I said, I'm allowed, so it's not like the whole class has to come along too. How does that sound?"

Keith blinked. Alone? Just with Shiro? Without any of the glares and whispers and deliberate shoulder bumps of his classmates when it didn't progress to something more? Keith didn't know Shiro, but he found he suddenly almost wanted to at that moment. No one else had noticed. No one else had offered him an out like that.

"Okay," he found himself saying. He kneaded his ribs absently once more. "Okay, I – yeah. That'd be cool."

Shiro's smile spread to a full grin. "Great! I'll book in a time slot, then. But not today." Rising to his feet, he extended a hand towards Keith, wriggling his fingers suggestively. "Today, I'm taking you to the nurse's office, if you don't mind. Better to get anything fixed up before it gets worse, right?"

Keith almost protested. He almost smacked away Shiro's hand, because he didn't need the help. He didn't need the support or the assistance of such an offering. But he paused, and he frowned, and tentatively, as though Shiro's fingers might burn him, he accepted his hand and the tug to his feet.

No one had ever offered him a hand before. No one had cared enough to bother.


	3. Two of Us

Shiro's slice swept so closely to Keith's head that he could feel the heat of it. Darting a glance over his shoulder, he caught a glimpse of the vibrant orange incision streaking across the metal beam before he leapt aside. He flung himself backwards down the hangar, Keith just managed to duck out of the way in time for the severed beam to collapse in a deafening clatter that shook the very floor beneath Keith's feet.

He straightened. His feet were planted widely, but it was still a struggle to stand. His breath gasped, heavy and panting, fingers clenching his knife so tightly that his hand trembled. That moment, the moment of rage and hatred that had gripped him as he'd pinned Shiro against the railing, had faded. In its place, Keith was left wrung like a squeezed dishrag, desperate and pleading.

 _Even if it isn't him, if it's not my Shiro…_ Keith's flinched as he dragged his gaze towards Shiro and met his flashing, alien eyes as they glared through the wreckage of the beam. He was sagging, bent double by the force of his strike to sever it completely. _Even if it's not him, I don't want to hurt him. I can't. Not if there's still a little bit of him remaining.._

"Shiro," Keith said, and he didn't care that it sounded like he was begging. "I know you're in there."

Shiro straightened, expression flat and closed.

"You made a promise once," Keith continued, desperately. "You told me you'd never give up on me."

Violet lightning crackled along Shiro's sparking arm as he growled into Keith's words. "And I should have abandoned you, just like your parents did. They saw that you were broken. Worthless. I should have seen it too."

The accusation slapped Keith as fiercely as any blow from Shiro's sword, but he didn't flinch. He couldn't. That part of him, his fear and pain and loss – it wasn't relevant. Not now. Not anymore with what he knew of his past, and his parents, and the what he had to believe of the real Shiro. Not when this Shiro would inflate any accusation that may carry a glimmer of uncertainty into proportions far exceeding those Keith could otherwise withstand in an effort to crumble his defences.

Keith wouldn't falter. He wouldn't let himself fall, not when Shiro's life was on the line.

"I'm not leaving here without you," he said, because it was true. Because Keith couldn't, wouldn't leave him if there was even a hint of who Shiro really was inside that clone's head. Not when Shiro would have, had done, the same for him.

Shiro only smirked. Eyes briefly closing, something like real amusement touched his features, though it was shadowed by the same sense of wrongness that welled in his gaze when he opened them again.

"Actually," he said lowly, cruelly, his voice thick with dreadful promise as his eyes narrowed, "neither of us are leaving."

* * *

Keith barely had to think. In many ways, it was better not to think at all. Not that he would ever tell any of his teachers. Especially not his flying instructor. Or Shiro.

But Keith did. When he flew, he didn't think so much as act. He didn't consciously decide the adjust his sights, didn't even recall what had urged him to glance towards the altimeter, to nudge his level to alter his angle of attack with a peripheral glance at the airfoil. It happened without thought, and that was what made it easier.

It made it better.

It made it _faster_.

It was what made Keith good enough at flying that, at twelve years old, he was allowed to fly a ship out of the hangar. An actual ship rather than just the crummy, unbelievable simulators he'd practiced in countless times over the past months.

Keith barely blinked as he peered through the front display. The spread of the plains stretched beneath him, chewed beneath the speed of his flight in an unbroken expanse of dirt and dust. The horizon sprawled in the distance, and in the late afternoon glow it seemed endless. But Keith barely noticed. He was hardly aware of what spread before him as he flicked a switch, nudged his compass course, and resettled his grasp upon the arms of his seat, fingers sinking into the sensitive pads and swivelling with minute adjustments to alter his stability and direction.

"Having fun?" a voice murmured in his ear with a hint of a chuckle.

Keith allowed himself a small smile. "Not yet," he said.

"Commander wants you back down in five."

"So, I can…?"

Shiro chuckled again, and even without being able to see him, Keith knew he grinned wide enough to crinkle the corners of his eyes. He'd seen it so many times before. "Go for it, Keith."

Keith went. His own smile widening, he cast a quick, assessing glance around the front display, across the spread of the cockpit, before sinking his fingers firmly into the pads on the arms of his chair.

He paused. He waited for the right tick of a moment. The ship zipped over a tall-reaching peak – and Keith thrust his arms forwards and drove the ship into a kick of acceleration.

It sprang forth. The sudden speed pressed Keith back into his seat, the pressure wedging him firmly, but he didn't care. He barely noticed. Sinking into instinctive reaction, his foot snapped forward of its own accord to kick a pedal, one hand darting towards another switch to flick the sights on the screen to his left. Keith let loose.

He soared at racing speed. He darted like a dragonfly over crags, whipping across the plains fast enough that his rear display showed a spray of dust in his wake from the spray of his engine. He arced around a peak, took a turn and a dive, thrust the right arm of his seat forwards in a directive lurch, and bared his teeth in a fierce grin as the ship took a corkscrew turn. He pulled out of it as it dipped nose-first towards the ground, whizzing through a pair of pillar-like crags, before jerking his arms backwards and pulling himself up in a vertical climb.

He soared. He fell and twisted, then rose again. Darting in dips and dives, Keith flung himself into instinctive enactment, into belly-lurching sweeps, revelling in the simple joy of flight that he never would have anticipated was possible had he not had the opportunity to really practice it himself. When he took a nose-dive and pulled out in a death roll, a curse muttered in his ear that wasn't Shiro's but was followed a moment later by Shiro's pointed "Keith".

Keith laughed, more to himself than to Shiro, but he heard Shiro echo his amusement. "Don't worry, sir," Keith heard as he took another tight turn and zipped in the vague direction of the distant Garrison. "He knows what he's doing."

"If he crashes one of my ships," Keith heard Instructor Greene grumble, but disregarded any further comment to the matter. With another lurch, another thrust, Keith thrust his accelerators into forward motion and charged across the plains in a flurry of rising dust once more.

When Shiro ordered him to touch down, Keith did so readily enough. Once, he might have dug his heels in, and a part of him still very much wanted to. Why couldn't he keep flying for just a little longer? There were other ships still about, after all, so it wasn't as though the one he was using flew alone. It wasn't even getting late. Not really. But he knew where he should stop pushing; Shiro's boundaries were different to that of the teachers and Keith's old carers at the home. They were more fluid, but they still existed. And Keith didn't want to push them too far. Not Shiro's.

Flicking switches instinctively as his ship slipped through the hangar doors and settled with a whirring sigh, Keith straightened in his seat. Before him, the hangar spread bright and luminous beneath fluorescent lights that drove away every shadow. Everywhere he could see perched a ship of some kind, hulking or small, sleek or bulky. It was, Keith had decided, glancing towards a jet he hadn't seen before and instantly decided he'd ask Shiro if they could explore, probably his favourite place in the world. Better even that his father's old farmhouse.

The ceiling-bound door to the cockpit hissed open with a sigh. As the glass slid aside, Keith glanced up from his seat to the opening above him. Shiro was peering down through the short chute shaking his head slightly at what could only be gentle chiding. But he was smiling just a little, and he extended a hand towards Keith without comment. Biting the inside of his lip to smother a smirk, Keith climbed to his feet and took the extended hand, allowing Shiro to haul him one armed from his cockpit.

"A death roll?" was all he murmured as Keith hooked an arm over the lip of the chute and clambered high enough to sling a leg over it. The Phantom S-44 was a tiny jet, and the chute through the top was the only way to slide into the bubble of a pocket reserved for the pilot. Tiny – but also one of the fastest and most agile that Keith had ever seen.

And he'd gotten the chance to fly it. It was only the second time he'd ever done so and, glancing down at the abandoned seat below him, he was only more eager to try again.

Before Keith and Shiro could climb down form the airstair Shiro had mechanically driven alongside the Phantom, before Keith could even formulate a reply, Instructor Greene was calling up from the foot of those with hands cupped around his mouth. "Kogane! I thought I said no stunts this time!"

Keith glanced towards the burly man who likely wouldn't have even been able to fit in the Phantom. He was frowning, the lines on his brow drawn all the more heavily, and his lips pursed almost petulantly when he dropped his hands from his face. He was annoyed, clearly, but not angry. It likely had something to do with the handful of senior students clustered around him, all grinning up at Keith and Shiro and muttering to one another with nudging elbows and sidelong glances.

Keith pursed his own lips, plucking at the lip of the phantom entrance he still perched upon. The urge to retort rose within him, not in defence necessarily but because he didn't like the connotations of Greene's tone, and it was only that Shiro stood at his side that he withheld. Shiro had brought him to the hangar, after all. He always did. If Keith got in trouble, then…

"Sorry, Instructor," Shiro said, leaning out over the airstair railing. "We'll remember for next time, I promise."

Greene planted his hands on his hips instead of around his mouth this time when he replied. "See that you do, Shiro," he said, lips drawing to the side. "You keep an eye him."

"I will, sir. I'll watch out for him."

Greene grunted. He spared another glance for Keith, but it was clear that it was Shiro's word rather than his confidence in Keith himself that had him nodding curtly and turning on his heel. He strode away with an distinct mutter under his breath.

No sooner had he disappeared from earshot than the cluster of seniors swept forward and grouped around the base of the ladder. Their exchanges ceased as they turned their attention instead to Keith and Shiro, faces shining with enthusiasm.

"That was awesome, Kogane," one said, grinning.

"I told that new guy, O'Reilly, that it was a twelve-year-old flying the Phantom, and he didn't believe me," said another with a bubbling chuckle.

"Have you practiced that dive before?"

"This is only the second time you've flown a Phantom before, isn't it?"

"That was awesome to watch."

Praise and questions were flung between them too fast for Keith to reply even if he'd been inclined. He didn't know their names, knew them only by face as Shiro's classmates, and he'd never spoken to any of them before directly. Even so, he wasn't wholly surprised that they spoke as they did; it wasn't the first time he'd been bombarded as such.

Since Shiro had first invited Keith down to the hangar months before, he'd been enchanted. Keith hadn't realised just how invested he could be in flying – or in anything – until Shiro had shown him the possibility. But slowly, for the first time, Keith realised that he liked something. He was truly interested in it, enough to seek knowledge pertaining to the planes he saw, to listen attentively to Shiro and, beyond that, in their flying class. He'd even taken to raising his hand in that class to ask a questions that, for still confusing reasons, left his classmates stunned. It was only when Shiro explained that it was likely as much for the content of the question as the fact that he'd spoken up at all that surprised them that he even had an inkling of understanding.

"Most kids in your year haven't even seen a Hamlet 600, let alone know its stats," Shiro had told him. "I doubt they've considered the logistics of interplanetary flight from something so small, Keith."

Keith didn't really understand that. Just because it wasn't part of their curriculum that year, what they were supposed to be being taught, didn't meant they shouldn't be exploring it. But then, he supposed he wouldn't have been quite so interested himself if he hadn't seen the Hamlet that had stopped over at the Garrison so briefly only the day before his class.

He was lucky, Keith realised. He was very lucky – that Shiro had taken him under his wing of sorts, and that he allowed him to accompany him down to the hangar. Even luckier when, barely a month ago, he'd somehow coaxed Greene into letting him fly.

"He's twelve," Greene had said, staring at Shiro as though he'd suddenly grown two heads.

"He is," Shiro had agreed, not even bothering to deny the fact. "But you've seen his simulation."

"His simulation was –"

"He's got the knack, sir. It would be wasted to keep him outside of a real plane when he could learn so much more from proper practice."

"Admittedly, yes, but he could –"

"Besides, he's already flown Scrapers before."

Greene stuttered to a stop, blinking rapidly. He glanced towards Keith, eyebrows shooting upwards to nearly disappear beneath his military beret. "You have?"

Keith shrugged before nodding. It wasn't like it was hard. Scrapers, the low-lying vehicles that could scarcely be called planes at all for their size and the inconsequential distance they could lift off the ground, were easy to fly. His father had let him when he was still alive, had an old model he'd practically built himself, and Keith had been far younger then. It wasn't particularly remarkable.

Or he'd thought so, until he mentioned it offhandedly to Shiro one time. Shiro's mute stare, the way his mouth flopped open, had suggested otherwise, even if Keith didn't exactly know why.

Apparently, that had been enough to convince Greene. That, and the fact that Shiro had promised to watch him. And to take responsibility for him. And to wear the punishment should any be necessarily inflicted. Just as Shiro had promised Greene would happen should Keith misstep with the Phantom again.

Clambering down the ladder after Shiro, Keith paused on the second to bottom rung, waiting for him to dip briefly into the babbling pool of his senior classmates and answer with a handful of replies. It happened like that a lot, Keith had noticed. Shiro often had the company of his classmates; they always approached him, friendly as anything, and he accepted their company. It would have been apparent to a blind man that he was well-liked. Sometimes Keith couldn't fathom why someone like Shiro would bother to set aside every other afternoon to take him down to the hangar. It didn't make sense, even if Shiro was his class mentor.

Still, he didn't comment. Keith didn't want to tempt fate to ruin a good thing.

When Shiro glanced over to where Keith stood, silent and discomforted on the bottom step of the airstair, a smile and a head tilt suggested their leave. Keith hopped silently down the remaining step and slipped wordlessly to his side. He withstood the pats on his shoulders from the seniors that weren't quite as uncomfortable as they'd once been, the nods of approval and further praise that was only a little less disconcerting than they had been the first time he'd received them. He and Shiro were striding from the hangar with many a called word echoing after them and an enduring raised hand from Shiro in reply. They wove through stationary vehicles towards the floor-level exit, and the voices had died to an unintelligible murmur in their wake by the time Shiro nudged the pedestrian door open.

The orange afternoon sun struck Keith as soon as he stepped through. Shielding his eyes, he glanced up at the sky as they strode away from the hangar in the direction of the greater Garrison complex, the promise of dinner just around the corner. Not that Keith really cared; it was a little hard to care about dinner when the thrill of flight still thrummed through him.

_The plummet of freefall…_

_The jerk of a catch, the fierce satisfaction as the jet rocked and hummed beneath his fingertips…_

_The swelling euphoria of tilting up, and up, and up, until he shot vertically towards the sky…_

Keith hadn't realised how much he could enjoy something. He hadn't realised it was possible. Not until Shiro showed him how.

"You were incredible today."

Dropping his hand from his eyes, Keith glanced towards Shiro where he smiled down at him. There was fondness in that smile. Satisfaction of his own, as though he felt just as Keith did. As if he hadn't just taken the blame for something that he hadn't any direct control over. Shiro didn't have that kind of power over Keith. Anger didn't drive his passing thought, but it was true. Shiro didn't have that hold on him, and that he'd taken the blame and accepted potential punishment…

"I can stand up for myself, you know," Keith said. He winced a second later, catching his bottom lip between his teeth. The words sounded so pathetically petulant. "I mean –"

"I know you can, Keith," Shiro said. Raising his arm, he dropped his hand onto Keith's shoulder and gave it a gentle squeeze. "There's nothing wrong with me adding my name to Greene's warning."

Shiro's hand – it wasn't as uncomfortable as that of the other seniors. Not at all, even if those seniors weren't quite so bad anymore. Just as his praise didn't feel quite as disconcerting, either. Still a little awkward, still a little strange, but not as bad. Not nearly.

Even so, Keith glanced down at Shiro's hand, gnawing his lip. "I was the one who did what I wasn't supposed to," he said lowly. "If Greene was going to tell anyone off, then it should be –"

"And I'm the one who asked you to come down to the hangar with me three months ago," Shiro interrupted him. "And the one who suggested you give flying a real go. And the one who asked Greene to let you."

Keith opened his mouth the reply, but his voice caught and he was left frowning down at his dusty boots as they made their way to the Garrison. When Shiro put it like that… But no. No, it was still –

"It's still my responsibility," Keith muttered. The euphoria hadn't abandoned him, but he felt it sink a little with regretful melancholy as Greene's words really settled upon him. It wasn't because he felt any kind of obligation towards Greene. Not at all, really. But that it would impact Shiro in some way?

Keith didn't really understand Shiro. He didn't understand why he was so unnecessarily kind, so unnecessarily friendly and unnecessarily giving towards Keith when Keith had given him nothing in return. The only one who had ever felt even remotely the same to how Shiro felt to him was his father, but…

 _But it's different,_ Keith thought. He wasn't quite sure how it was, but that much he knew. _It's different, it's…_

Still frowning at his boots, Keith kicked his toe mid-step. "You shouldn't have to get in trouble because of something that I did," he muttered. "It's me. It's my fault. You shouldn't have to –"

"Yeah, well, maybe I want to." Shiro shook Keith's shoulder gently where he still clasped it, and when Keith glanced at him from the corner of his eye, he was smiling as though he hadn't a care in the slightest. As though he really did want to put himself forward. Want, not obligation because, as a senior mentor, he should. "We're in this together, Keith. The two of us. Okay?"

Keith slowed in step and Shiro slowed alongside him. He blinked up at Shiro, mouth opening, but no words falling out, Shiro only continued to smile down at him. Just smiled. Still smiled. When Keith managed to swallow past the lump that had risen in his throat, a thickness that he couldn't quite comprehend but left him with a funny feeling nonetheless, he could only nod. He could only accept Shiro's words.

Shiro hummed something that sounded like approval before, with another brief squeeze, he let go of Keith's shoulder. "Come on," he said, picking up their pace once more to step beneath the shadow of the encroaching Garrison. "Let's head into dinner. I'd still like to talk about your flight, but we haven't even touched on your aviation homework today, and I know you said you don't need it, but the extension stuff McAllister gave you could probably be…"

Keith listened as Shiro spoke. He listened, and he picked up his feet to hasten after him, falling in step at Shiro's side in a way that had become to utterly natural.


	4. Coming For You

Magenta light flared. The hangar flickered in another domino effect of blossoming light. Keith heard the crackle of energy and couldn't help but glance up at the towering heights of the hangar looming like a viciously glaring spotlight above them. Distant as it was, he could see the bolts of lightning electricity brought to violent life spark and dance around the face of what could only be a laser.

Shiro's grunt, his vocal pants, snapped Keith's attention back towards where he stood further along the bridge. Breath stuttering to a halt, he watched as Shiro's arm burst into light itself, every inch of it flooded white-pink as though burning hot. Its radiance was so fierce that Keith could only squint, taking an instinctive step backwards despite the distance and the wreckage that lay between them.

Swirls of light in particles of visible energy swept around Shiro's arm. With a wrenching sweep, he swung it overhead, the arc of its motion leaving a trail of afterglow in its wake – but Shiro didn't move to strike the ground as he had before like Keith half expected. Crying in an outburst of agony, he staggered, lurched, and crumpled to his knees, lightning-struck hand slamming into the ground in a thundering, cracking smack.

"Shiro!" Keith cried, staggering a step towards him.

Shiro didn't hear. That, or he didn't care. Head bowed, teeth bared and eyes squeezed shut, he cried in an outburst of pain and ferocity and, hissing anger exhaled with each pant. Before Keith could even consider leaping to his aid, that hand spilt a pool of white-pink light into the floor beneath it that burst into a beam of energy, shooting through the thick metal.

The blast exploded with deafening force. It cracked and groaned, reverberating as it sliced upwards with Shiro's wayward lurch. Keith barely had a second to throw himself to the side of the bridge, colliding into the railing, as that beam of energy sliced a perfect incision down the very centre of the hangar. The entire floor upended and tilted beneath him; had he not grabbed the railing, Keith was sure he would have been flung over the side.

Beneath the bridge, something exploded. A little closer, something snapped with a brutal tearing crack. Smoke erupted into the air, and the crumpling, rumbling sound of stone blasted loose reached Keith's ears. Hanging onto the railing for dear life, Keith struggled to retain his footing and haul himself upright.

A glance over his shoulder saw the back end hangar, the tail of the bridge he stood upon, fracture before the precise slice and tumble into shards of shattered pieces. Below, behind, even above - it was falling down, falling around him, around them, but that hardly mattered. For the moment, it wasn't important, and even less so when Keith swung his gaze back towards where he'd last seen Shiro. His eyes widened.

Shiro was no longer on his knees. He was no longer gasping, and though his teeth were still bared, it was in a visage less pained and more a semblance of his previous cruel sneer. Keith caught only the beginning of the gesture as Shiro began to raise his lightning-struck hand from the cracked and fractured floor, fingers curled into white-bright claws. It was all he had time for before instinct demanded _run!_

Keith turned. He fled. Charging towards the end of the splintered bridge, he took a flying leap and flung himself into mid-air just in time to duck the beam of white-hot light as thick as the bridge itself blasted after him. he flipped, spun, twisted into a roll, and crashed into the distant ledge, the clone-lined ledge that he'd started upon and somehow circled all the way back to. Keith only just managed to roll to his feet, to turn and cast a split-second glance towards Shiro, before Shiro's distant figure raised his hand once more and shot his beam of destructive light in a second blast.

Again, the hangar was sliced into pieces. It split like butter beneath a hot knife. Smoke erupted and the floor dipped as it groaned and tilted. Keith threw himself along the platform bridge, unable to spare even a glance towards the clones in their pink-lit capsules, silent and more dead than asleep.

Another shot. An explosion. And another. Another strike and the rumbling avalanche that followed.

The floor tilted again, twisting, unhinged. It twisted too far, even, and mid stride Keith found himself flung from his feet and sliding down the floor that had become a vertical wall instead. A cry was torn from his lips, and it was all he could do to keep a hold of the knife still clasped in his hand and to slide down the floor rather than be thrown away from it.

What followed happened so fast that Keith couldn't have acted had he the thought to do so. It was too fast, too desperate, and as he crashed into the poor excuse of a floor at the bottom of the pseudo-wall, the groaning weight of a falling – beam? Wall? Capsule? – tumbling towards him demanded every muscle leap into action. All but blinded, he was on his feet, was throwing himself into midair once more, leaping towards what had to be the lowest floor of the hangar that was little more than a suspended disc at the base of the primary column.

Metal beams tumbled around him as he fell. Shards of shrapnel, fractured pieces of walls, shattered glass from broken capsules – Keith barely noticed any of it in the crazed flurry of his tumble. He didn't know where Shiro was, could only hold hope that he wasn't above him, wasn't even then raising his hand to shoot that destructive light once more. Soaring through open air, Keith stretched his reach into an arcing dive.

He was lucky. Just lucky. Lucky enough that, with the force of what must have broken a finger or two, he struck the lip of the disc-shaped floor and latched on for dear life. His knife, flung from his grasp, soared end over end across the platform, but Keith didn't see it land. He was hanging, panting, and with sweat dripping down his face it was all he could do to cling to the last lifeline that was given to him.

His body felt impossibly heavy as he hung from the lip. Exhaustion gripped him, but with a heave, a struggle of straining muscles, Keith hauled himself from suspension up onto the floor. He was aware of the entire length of the capsule bridge tumbling past him into empty space, but only detachedly. Panting, collapsing onto his back and wincing as his fingers protested their sudden release from grasping, he fought against a bout of dizziness.

But only for a moment. Just a moment was all Keith spared to lie sprawled, half-defeated, before urgency demanded he roll over and search for his knife. A turn of his head and he caught sight of it, embedded tip-down in the metal floor barely twenty feet away. Relief battled against Keith's exhaustion. Heaving himself onto his belly, onto hands and knees that trembled with the effort, he crawled towards it, reaching, desperate.

He hurt. Everything hurt. The fall, the adrenaline that had torn through him at Shiro's killing shot, seemed to have intensified ever spasm of pain. Keith doubted he could stand if he wanted to – but he didn't need to. If he could just reach his knife… If could just grasp his weapon in order to defend himself…

The effort was too great. Too great to do with any speed. An arm's length away from his knife, Keith peripherally caught sight of Shiro plummeting through the air towards him. In a moment of crumpling defeat, all he could do was slump to the ground in a groan. Forehead pressed against the cold metallic floor, Keith squeezed his eyes closed as Shiro landed in a solid, echoing thud barely a body length away from him. He drew a ragged breath as Shiro's footsteps clunked towards him. His fingers twitched as the sound of Shiro's sword hummed to life, and then –

Desperation. The same desperation that had him fighting. The same desperate need that demanded his screaming muscles act demanded of him again. Keith grabbed at his knife with frantic speed, and as Shiro's sword arced towards him, managed to raise his weapon and fling himself backwards enough to catch its full weight.

He was panting, or maybe that was Shiro. Keith wasn't sure. He could only feel the quivering protest of his abused fingers as they clung to the hilt of his knife, could only see Shiro's hardened face, frown fierce and eyes manic with their foreign light. His arms trembled with the effort to hold Shiro's full weight above him, off him, the force of Shiro's attack pinning him to the ground as he loomed over him.

"Shiro, please," Keith gasped, almost sobbed, yet the grief that tore through him was more for Shiro than for himself. For what they'd lost. "You were my brother. I love you."

Through the shaking of his arms, the sobs that were nearly voiced and shaking him just as much, Keith saw Shiro's face contort. His frown didn't retreat, but it twisted as though he was afflicted by a muscular spasm, and just for a fraction of a second the weight of his forceful attack eased.

Only slightly, however. Only for a second. A beat later and he was leaning forward once more with redoubled force, his own sword trembling with the strain. "Just let go, Keith," he growled through his teeth. "You don't have to fight anymore."

Keith winced, squeezing his eyes closed. His arms quivered with the strain, yet he seethed with the need to thrust away, to resist, to win just as he'd won so many battles in the past. _I'll never stop fighting, Shiro. Not for you._

"The team's already gone," Shiro said, low and fierce.

Keith flinched. The words struck him like a blow and he cringed before them. His arms shook violently, faltering. _No. No, I have to stop this. They're not gone, they're not, and I have to stop –_

"I saw to it myself."

_Enough!_

Pain and rage, hatred and a resurgence of that desperation, tore through Keith. He cared. He cared so damn much – for Shiro, for the team, for the fight to end. He wanted it all. With an aching scream that tore his throat, that overwhelming feeling pulsed through him and it swept aside his weaknesses.

His eyes stung, and he heaved his knife upward. His cheeks burned as though slapped by the shock of his motion, and he thrust Shiro off him. With a lurch of overwhelming strength, a fierce swing not of his knife but of his conjured Bayard, Keith severed Shiro's glowing arm straight through the bicep.

Shiro bellowed. Flung backwards by the force of the thrust, the strike, and his own flinch, he lurched away from Keith, staggering in retreat. Crumpling, he hunched upon himself. He grasped frantically at his severed limb, fingers shaking. Cries and pants, the wavering totter of footsteps clanking on the metal floor, stuttered from him as he fell to his knees in a jumbled heap.

And before him, Keith rose. That blast of force, of power, froze the objections and protestations of his exhausted limbs. It let him stand, let him straighten without even a waver. But it didn't smother the heart-wrenching pain mercillesly sucked at his chest as he watched Shiro writhe in pain.

 _I'm sorry_ , he thought. _I had to do it. I have to bring you back._

If causing Shiro that much pain was the only way to do it, then… then Keith would. He had to. He knew it was the right thing to do when Shiro, his Shiro, collapsed to his knees and dragged his head upwards to face him. His features were contorted, his stare haggard, but in a different way this time.

"Keith," Shiro whispered, voice hoarse. This time, it was uttered in a quaver of his own desperation.

* * *

The hall was thick with the sound of applause, still ringing in a resounding echo of approval that only gradually faded into respectful silence once more. Everywhere were people, thick in a crowd of dutifully attending trainees, families beaming with pride or tight-lipped satisfaction, pilots, and instructors. They stared towards the slightly raised platform at the very front of the hall, barely a single person blinking. None moved to disrupt the proceedings but to applaud in wordless congratulation when appropriate.

But not Keith. Keith didn't clap, and not because he was being difficult. Not because he was making a point of being rebellious, or because he thought that the graduates on the stage didn't deserve it. It was an exasperating procedure, the graduation, and one that Keith considered only one more attribute of the Garrison that conflicted with his own understanding of what should be deemed necessary, but it happened whether he wanted it to or not. There was no escaping it, no avoiding attendance. Keith stood in watchful muteness like every other trainee.

But he didn't clap. He couldn't. Not when the commander and principal sidestepped along the line of waiting graduates and extended their hands respectively to their next candidate. Not when they paused at one graduate in particular.

"Shirogane Takashi," rang out across the hall in a clear, crisp announcement that beamed with as much pride as the smiling faces in the crowd. "Congratulations on your well-deserved success. You have done the Garrison a great service with your commitment."

The words were the same as those offered to each of the graduates standing at sharp attention and extending in either direction to where Shiro stood tall and straight himself, his graduate beret affixed and gaze trained stoically and directly ahead of himself. But at the principal's words, a hint of a smile touched his lips. From where Keith stood, when the hall erupted with enthusiastic applause, someone even whistling their approval from the back of the hall, it looked like it might have widened just a bit.

Which it likely did. Someone like Shiro... When the crowd screamed his name and their love of him even without verbalisation, he wouldn't deny them acknowledgement in the form of something like a smile. It wasn't who he was. That crowd… To Keith's ears, they clapped just a little louder than they had for everyone else. He knew they did. Everyone loved Shiro, and even had his own family been absent, there was a wealth of adoring attendants to take up the baton of congratulations.

Shiro accepted the principal's words. He shook the hand of the commander, replied with his oath to the request for service and commitment asked of him, and snapped to sharp attention once more as the hall erupted a second time and the principal and commander edged along to the next graduate. That second time too the applause seemed to last just a little longer, and Shiro offered his thanks with a real smile and the very slightest forward tip of his head.

Keith swallowed thickly as he stared up at Shiro. His teeth were sunken so far into his bottom lip that he was sure he'd long ago broken the skin, but he didn't care. Hands clenched tightly at his sides, not unwilling but unable to join those around him in their applause, he stared and felt a weight tighten around his chest.

 _I'm so stupid,_ he told himself, just as he had for days leading up to the event.

 _It's not like it changes anything,_ he reminded himself, just as Shiro had told him repeatedly, as though he'd known Keith's thoughts and the confusing riot of emotions that he couldn't explain roiling through him.

_He's not even leaving the Garrison._

_He'll still be… still be here._

_It doesn't change anything._

_Nothing will change._

_Nothing will change at all._

_Nothing will…_

No matter how much Keith coaxed himself into accepting his own reality, it didn't help. That Shiro was only graduating, that he would simply become a fully-fledged pilot, and that though his residency would be outside of the dorms, he would be easy walking distance away located in an alternative wing of the Garrison. All of the pilots were. That was what happened. Always.

But it didn't help.

The other part of Keith felt Shiro's graduation like a punch in the gut, except that this one couldn't be as easily ignored as a real one. He felt that Shiro was in motion. That he would be leaving, if only a little bit. That he would go on missions, undertaking jobs and fulfilling tasks that would take him away from the Garrison far further than the easy couriering missions that the seniors were permitted to tag along to. That other part of Keith couldn't help but stare up at Shiro and wonder why all he could see was a pile of heaped dirt, a poor excuse for a headstone, and a farmhouse that seemed so completely abandoned despite that it had housed two people only a day before.

 _Nothing will change,_ he tried to remind himself, but Keith knew it was a fallacy. Everything changed. It always did.

 _And when he's gone then I'll just go right back…_ Swallowing the sickly feeling that rose in the back of his throat, Keith lowered his gaze to the shoulder's of the boy standing before him. He couldn't watch anymore. He couldn't watch as Shiro swelled with pride in his accomplishments just as he should be allowed to. He couldn't listen as the graduates further along the line, one after the other, were congratulated just as Shiro had been, and he couldn't raise his hands to dutifully applaud. Even if he'd wanted to, they didn't seem able to lift from where they hung limply at his sides. All Keith could do was stand still and silent, staring at the boy in front of him, and then he couldn't even do that anymore.

Tucking his chin, Keith turned and ducked along the narrow aisle between standing students. He ignored the hisses and murmurs of annoyance, the eyes that followed him and that he could feel pin his back with a glare. Keith didn't care. He barely noticed them as he ducked from the attentive crowd and strode on silent feet towards the back of the hall and the promise of escape.

A part of Keith knew he'd be scolded. A part of him knew that it would make work for Shiro, because Shiro had a habit of stepping forth in his defence. But those parts couldn't seem to care at that moment, and even when he broke into a run in the last few steps of his escape, lurching past a frowning teacher with mouth opening to draw him to a halt, Keith didn't care.

The sounds of applause as another graduate was congratulated chased after him, and another part of Keith couldn't help but think it was well-timed; he could imagine much of a same response with a different kind of satisfaction greeting his eventual expulsion from the Garrison. He knew it would happen. _Knew_ it. That eventuality felt abruptly far closer than Keith had expected. And, he suddenly realised, than he wanted it to be.

Keith didn't really know where he ran to. He didn't return to the Garrison dormitories and the shoebox of a room he shared with a classmate he barely knew the name of. He didn't head to the Garrison itself at all but instead found himself flying across the dusty, deserted grounds without looking back, his crisp Garrison uniform all too constrictive in the afternoon heat. He'd shed his jacket before he left the shadows of the building complex and discarded it without a thought a second later. Lost or otherwise, he couldn't bring himself to care what happened to it.

There wasn't truly a way to escape the confines of the Garrison. It was utterly isolated; a marked stretch from the nearest town, as much to ensure an absence of distraction to its students as to enable privacy and space for air traffic, it would take more time than Keith knew he could commit to make a break for real escape. His father's old house was even further away, and though a piece of him ached to return to it's empty rooms, a larger piece of him wished to be as far away from it as possible.

Keith's breath grew heavy far quicker than it should have when he finally ground to a halt at the craggy edge of a hill. Gasping, he edged towards the lip and, shielding his eyes, peered beyond at the stretch of nothingness spreading before him. Absolute nothingness. The promise of nothing.

Breath stuttering, Keith scrubbed his eye with a fist. It burned slightly, though from the dry, dusty air, the blinding sunlight, or something else he wasn't sure. It was uncomfortable in the afternoon heat, but Keith didn't shrink away from it in search of shade. All he could manage was to drop onto his haunches and then, as his breathing slowed with a series of haphazard hitches that he couldn't prevent, onto his rump with a puff of sand.

Keith sat. He stared. He didn't want to think, but what crossed his mind was the same thoughts over and over again, that same nagging voice whispering of the very decline from the height that Keith had been perched upon for the past year and hadn't even noticed he stood upon. His attention had been too focused upon Shiro. And now Shiro was…

Now he was…

And Keith would be…

Sinking his teeth into his lip once more, all Keith could do was wrap his arms around his knees and drop his chin onto them. He didn't want to move. He didn't want to go anywhere, he abruptly decided, and definitely not with the prospect of facing his classmates in the mess hall for dinner, or his roommate should he return to his dormitory.

Keith sat, and he thought the thoughts that wouldn't leave him alone.

He sat, and he felt the feelings that were too jumbled to make any sense of.

He sat, and he stared at nothing yet somehow everything, for that everything presented itself before him whether he wanted to see it or not. Dirt graves and empty houses. Different houses filled with too many people and presided over by bored carers. The sharp contrast of his afternoons spent in the hangar, or the times when Shiro coaxed him to the table with his own senior classmates and the friendless of those seniors in spite of the frowns and mutters it triggered from those in Keith's grade.

He barely noticed when the sun began to fall. He watched as it oozed down the horizon, but he didn't really see it. It was only when a shiver trembled down his arms that he even noticed the abrasive heat had died to something almost cold.

That was when Shiro found him.

"Hey."

Keith didn't move. He wasn't sure if he couldn't shift from the position he'd been in for hours or if he didn't want to. Not that it mattered.

"I was looking for you before. No one knew where you went."

Shiro's crunching step edged up behind Keith, then to his side where Keith could see him only from his periphery. Yet he still didn't move. Or couldn't.

"Are you okay?"

From his tone, Keith knew that Shiro understood what was wrong, even if Keith didn't entirely know what it was himself. It annoyed him suddenly, that Shiro would know even before Keith did, but that annoyance faded into the resignation that had settled upon him throughout the dragging afternoon.

"Congratulations," he said, hating that his voice sounded so dull but unable to do anything about it. "You're finally a proper pilot. I bet everyone knew you'd make top of the class."

"Keith," Shiro began.

"Did you have to do a speech?" Keith's fingernails sunk into his forearms but he couldn't otherwise bring himself to move. "I didn't see. Sorry; I left. I wasn't feeling well."

"Not feeling -?" Shiro's tone spiked, abruptly louder. "Are you okay -?"

"I bet it would have been really good." The niggling pain of Keith's fingernails was grounding as he dug them in deeper. "You're heaps better at speaking in front of a crowd than I would be. People actually listen to you."

Shiro didn't say anything this time, so Keith's voice, his string of meaningless words that he hadn't even considered before speaking them, faded into silence. He stared at the orange lip of sun that was all that remained of the day and shrugged off the urge to shiver once more.

Finally, as the sun sunk to little more than a sliver of reddish glow, Shiro sighed. Dropping to a crouch, he settled alongside Keith close enough for their shoulders to touch. Keith wasn't sure whether he wanted to lean into him or draw away so settled for stony stillness.

"You know," Shiro said slowly, "nothing's going to change."

 _So you keep saying_ , Keith thought.

"I'll still be around. Even when you can't see me, it's not like I've disappeared."

_But it will feel like it._

"And sure, I might be a little busier, and I might have to leave the Garrison sometimes, but first-year-outs never go particularly far, and we don't get our first big missions for at least a few years at the earliest. No intergalactic travel just yet, I promise."

Shiro chuckled, leaning slightly into Keith's shoulder as though he expected Keith to do the same in return, but Keith could hardly think to do so. His smiling muscles felt not broken but absent entirely. The echo of Shiro's voice rung in his ears like a promise of future disappearance.

Everything changes eventually.

Slowly, Shiro's chuckles and querying hums faded, and any hint of amusement died with it. But he didn't lean away from Keith's shoulder. Rather, raising an arm, he dropped a hand atop Keith's head in such an unexpected gesture that Keith couldn't help but glance sidelong towards him.

Shiro wore a small smile, but there was no hint of merriment to it. He nodded slightly as Keith met his gaze. "I'm still here, Keith," he said. "I'll still be around, even when I'm working. You got that?"

Keith didn't reply immediately, but at when Shiro gave a gentle scrub of his hair, an equally gentle rock into him as though to coax a response, he nodded. "Yeah," he said lowly. "I got it."

"We'll still hang out."

"I… I know."

"And even if I'm busy, you can still always visit me." Shiro's smile grew a little as he tipped his head. "Provided it's outside of class hours, of course. You'll just have to be the one to come and get me sometimes, do you think?"

Of course Shiro would somehow manage to slip Keith's academic responsibilities into the discussion. Keith wasn't surprised – or at least not by that. What did startle him slightly was his other words.

 _I can… go and see him._ Keith blinked, frowning down at his knees. _I could. He always comes to pick me up from my dormitory, or after class, or from the mess hall. I could just... just go and see him._

It didn't feel like a foolproof plan. Keith felt like he was missing something, some key point, and the thought that niggled like a gnawing gnat in the back of his head still muttered that it would only be for a little while. That Keith would more than likely be headed back to the home with it's detached carers within a few years - within a year, even - and that he should just accept it and leave before he could get expelled. It would be worse to be kicked out than to walk away.

But for the moment, the flurry of thoughts and emotions battling in his head and belly respectively seemed to take a pause. Beneath the weight of Shiro's hand still rested warmly atop his head, Keith nodded. "Alright," he said. "Then don't you forget it. I'll be coming to and get you, okay?"

He wasn't looking at him, but Keith felt Shiro's smile widen into a beaming grin. He felt it like the radiance of the vanishing sun, and even if Keith didn't know how long it could all last, it made his words worth it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A/N: Sorry for the late update! I'll try and be a bit more efficient next time.  
> Thank you to the lovely people who have shown me so much kindness and support with their comments. I can't thank you lovelies enough. You give me the nudge to keep posting (which sounds bad, but it's totally true). So thank you all so, so much!


	5. Try Again

Cables snapped. The hangar groaned. The spotlight overhead, glaringly white-pink and abusively bright, tumbled from the column to soar down past into empty space.

It was falling apart – the hangar, the entire asteroid – and there was nothing Keith could do about it. Nothing but fling himself towards Shiro as the disc-floor they stood upon tilted and wavered before upending entirely.

A maddened scramble. A frantic slide. A desperate grab for something, anything, to slow their fall. As the hangar crumbled, the floor tipped vertically and hanging by a thread, Keith was dropped into empty space himself with only his hold upon Shiro and his knife to steady him.

He swung a wayward strike. That was all he could do. As they slid down the floor, Shiro limp and unresponsive in Keith's grasp, he swung his knife and struck the floor, piercing the metal in a jagged slash. For a moment, they still fell. Debris tumbled around them, past them, spraying Keith with painful yet negligible flecks of metallic shards. He paid them no mind. He clung to Shiro, grasping his remaining arm with as much single-minded dedication as he did the knife that jerked to a stop and held them against the tipped floor. It wasn't much, but it was enough to stall their descent.

Keith panted, gasping for breath that didn't feel like it had eased even once throughout his entire fight. Squeezing his eyes closed, he struggled against the stretching pain that seemed intent upon tearing his arms from his shoulder sockets as he held both his own and Shiro weight suspended dangling in thin air. Shiro's weight hung limp and heavy beneath him, and the screaming pain of clinging to the knife where it stuck into the wall above him was just as heavy.

When Keith finally dragged his eyes open again, it was to behold the dizzying openness of empty space beneath him, interrupted by the distant, shapeless pieces of disembowelled hangar and formless ash drifting into nothingness. Glancing upwards at his knife, the only thing holding them from following after the hanger that was little more than a linchpin, Keith fought the urge to readjust his grip. He struggled with the same as he glanced down towards Shiro, his hand twisted awkwardly and so, so close to letting go.

Through clenched teeth, Keith drew a deep breath and hauled – upon Shiro, upon the knife, upon the possibility of somehow, in any way, climbing back onto stable ground. His struggle lasted for barely seconds before the knife gave out, sliding with a groan and another jagged slice through the metal of the suspended floor and dropping them a jolting foot lower.

Keith couldn't withhold his cry, torn loose as much by anger as fear. He could feel sweat dribbling down his face, cold and clammy against his cheeks. He hissed through clenched teeth, sparing another glance towards Shiro's unconscious body.

His heart had somehow clambered into his mouth. That was how it felt. It was what Keith thoughts as need voiced itself in his mind. _We've been through so much_. Memories played before his eyes in rapid succession, blotting out the wreckage around them, demanding and reminding, incessant. _So much, Shiro. So much, and you've always been there for me. I have to… I have to do this. I have to save you._

The hangar groaned. Then it fell.

The cables holding the tilted floor strained. Then they snapped.

Keith's knife gave out, and in a merciless fling, he was cast away from minimal stability into open air. It was terrifying, in a way. Somehow more terrifying than it was to be alone and suspended in space without a ship. Somehow more terrifying than to be alone and running for his life.

It was more terrifying because Keith had Shiro clasped in hand, and he wasn't letting go. He never would. No matter how far they fell or what battles they had to fight through together or even in opposition, Keith wouldn't let go.

As they fell through the tumbling wreckage, Keith stared down at Shiro's unconscious form falling beneath him. His face was softened from their lines of hatred, softened into the pain that Shiro wore so well and so often. It was a reflection of everything that Keith felt within him in that moment, and it was almost too much to behold.

So he closed his eyes. He blinded himself. But even so, in the silence of his own mind, as they plummeted to their deaths, he opened them once more and he made a promise. _I'll never let go, Shiro. Never._

* * *

Keith didn't look at the boy sitting beside him. He knew that Gabe was glaring, that he'd been glaring ever since they'd been planted at opposite ends of the short line of seats by a firm word and an even firmer stare. Keith didn't care. Gabe could glare all he liked; it wasn't like it would do anything. Gabe didn't hold any significance to him, anyway.

Keith didn't look down the empty hallway either. He didn't glance up at the sound of voices from the distant corner. He didn't lift his chin to turn when a door opened in the distance of the opposite direction, either. He didn't fidget in his seat, nor slouch and mutter a curse or huff as soon at the assistant principal closed the door into her office with a sharp snap like Gabe did. Keith didn't even glance towards the door or the window behind him in curiosity or guilt or apprehension, not to behold what was taking place just a room away.

His cheek throbbed a little. A cut on the corner of his mouth stung. His knuckles were bruised, peeling on one hand where he'd torn through the skin. The back of his head felt like it was swelling with a growing lump, the bruise already arising. Spots of further bruises dotted him all over, his muscles grumbling in protest to their familiar abuse.

But Keith ignored them. He ignored them all in favour of frowning at his knees and struggling to further ignore the murmurs seeping through the door. It didn't work. He heard them only too well.

"Troublemaker," Assistant Principal Kendell said. "Troublemaker" and "a problem". "Need to do something," and "has become a real issue" and "good grades can't erase bad behaviour". Keith didn't want to listen, didn't want to hear it, but he couldn't help it. Why did Kendell have to speak so loudly? What was the point of a door if she did?

Maybe the disapproval should have stung. Maybe Keith should have been slumping with the same guilt that had Gabe's shoulders sagged and chin lowered, despite his persistent glare. But even after years at the Garrison, after realising, and understanding, and agreeing that it had given him so much, had allowed him so much, had enabled _so much_ , Keith couldn't care. He was frustrated, and for no particular reason. He was upset, and he didn't know why. He was annoyed – by his teachers, his classmates, his schoolwork – and if asked, he wouldn't have been able to pinpoint the exact reason for being annoyed except for the fact that he was. He just was.

 _Shiro said he gets it_ , Keith thought to himself. _He said he understands why I'm 'acting out' or whatever. I wish he'd tell me, 'cause I have no clue._

Thought of Shiro had Keith wincing internally. He might not care about Kendell's disapproval, but to have it coming from Shiro… that was different. Frown deepening, Keith's hands curled into fists on his thighs. Shiro shouldn't… he shouldn't have to…

"… the only reason he's still here is because you vouched for him." Kendell's voice picked up slightly, almost as though she was ensuring her words filtered through the closed door. "You need to make sure this doesn't happen again."

Jaw clenching, Keith shut his ears to Shiro's reply. He didn't want to hear it. Not from Shiro. He didn't care about Kendell, but if he'd made Shiro angry – or, as was more likely, resigned and just a little upset - Keith didn't want that. It made him feel sick to his stomach to consider.

Why? Why did Shiro have to make sure 'this doesn't happen again'? Why did Shiro have to take the blame, bowing his head in acquiescence and obligingly claim that he would do his best to 'tame the troublemaker'? It wasn't his job. He shouldn't have to take responsibility for Keith. He shouldn't have to step up as he had done countless times over the years – to the commander, to Keith's teachers, even to his classmates – to ask for permission, or to apologise, or to tamper down the aggression that arose from the stupid kids that Keith had to learn alongside. They were all jerks anyway. Why should Keith have to pander to their grumbling complaints, let alone Shiro?

And yet he did. Time and time again, ever since Keith had met him, since he'd first spoken to him and had gradually become something that was sort of like a friend but was also sort of something more, Shiro had done it. He didn't complain, didn't sigh as though he begrudged lending Keith a hand as no one ever had since his father had died. He just did it. Shiro didn't even attend the Garrison as a student anymore, or a mentor as he'd once been to Keith's class. He was swamped beneath his own work, traveled further and for longer in his trips, and barely had a moment to himself -

So why? Why should Shiro be responsible? Why, after everything that had happened, would he still bother? Keith was frustrated, and upset, and annoyed, and he couldn't understand it. Even if Shiro was something more than his friend…

 _He shouldn't have to deal with me_ , Keith thought, his fingernails digging into his palms in a sharp pang that didn't really even hurt all that much. _He should just leave me alone. I don't even know why I get angry all the time, or why I always get into fights even when I don't want to, but… he should just leave me alone._

Keith didn't listen to Shiro's reply in Kendell's office. He couldn't. He didn't listen to what Kendell said in return either as he frowned down at his knees, ignoring the throbbing of his bruises and Gabe's glares equally. He didn't glance up at the shuffling of steps within the office either, or when the door opened and Shiro stepped out. Not even when the door hissed in a sliding close again and Shiro stepped to his side with a murmured, "Hey."

"Look, I know I messed up," Keith said through his teeth. The words tumbled forth almost without his behest, and though they hurt to speak aloud, he knew he had to say them. He should have said them a long time ago. "You should send me back to the home already. This place isn't for me."

The home. The home would suck. It would suck so much that Keith almost cringed to consider it a possibility. But the Garrison? School life? The rules and restriction, his classmates who'd never liked him and never would, his propensity for landing himself in fights – it wasn't for him. Keith knew that. He thought he'd known it for years, even if he hadn't quite let himself accept it.

Shiro's graduation had changed that. In the years since, Keith simply couldn't deny it anymore.

"Keith," Shiro said, his voice low but nonetheless emphatic . "You can do this. I will never give up on you." The barest pause, and then even more firmly, "But more importantly, you can't give up on yourself."

Keith was fighting the urge to tear his palms open with his fingernails for how tightly he clenched them. It hurt, Shiro's words. It hurt to be spoken to so kindly when he knew he'd done the wrong thing by the Garrison's rules. It hurt that when Shiro spoke, Keith always felt it as though the very words struck a resounding chord within him. It hurt because when Shiro spoke to Keith, he always sounded like he meant every word he spoke. He always had.

But what hurt most of all was Shiro's confidence. It was his final, utterly certain words that resounded and all but dragged Keith's gaze towards him. _I will never give up on you_ , was something Shiro had told him before. It was something that Keith knew, and even if he couldn't accept it for the eternal uncertainty for the fact that no one ever really meant 'never' and 'forever', when Shiro said it he felt it too.

But more that that… _You can't give up on yourself._

Giving up. On himself. It was something that Keith hadn't considered. Giving up… on himself? Giving up what? What was there to give up on? After all, despite what Shiro said and what his senior classmates had jokingly praised him for years ago, despite what his flight instructor begrudgingly claimed and what his grades might say, Keith knew he was nothing. He was nobody. He was a foster care kid who'd lucked out by fluking the Garrison exam, and he would almost certainly end up back in the system because –

Keith blinked. His whirring, insistent thoughts drew up short. _Oh_ , he thought, feeling his shoulders sag and slumping as he hadn't allowed himself to for the entire hour he'd been sitting outside Kendell's office. _I get it. So that's what he meant._

Giving up on himself. Giving up on the thought of stepping forward. Resisting the resigned, begrudging, but ultimately promising words of his teachers that said he would be a good pilot, might even be great if he could smother his rebelliousness and apparently insatiable urge to pick a fight.

_You can't give up on yourself._

Keith wasn't giving up. Or at least he hadn't thought he was. But when Shiro spoke, and when he stared up at Shiro's determined face set into nothing short of open confidence in Keith as he'd always held, Keith realised for the first time that giving up - wasn't that kind of the same as not trying at all?

Keith didn't know what to think about that. He didn't know if he could really try, or if he even wanted to. Being signed up to the Garrison was a decision that had been made for him, not by him, and although he'd found flying nothing short of addictive despite sinking into a familiarity that erased the euphoria a little, he hadn't wanted it. Every part of Garrison life, from the dormitory living, to the classes that hadn't really piqued his interest in all the years he'd attended, to teachers and their rigid guidelines didn't fit him... none of it was particularly enjoyable.

But not even trying to fit the system – wasn't that the same as giving up?

Keith didn't know if he cared. He wasn't sure there was anything particularly wrong with not trying for something he didn't even want. Who wanted to become a pilot all that badly anyway? Being a pilot for the Garrison wasn't necessarily synonymous with flying planes, and Keith didn't care enough about titles to warrant pursuing it. But if Shiro wanted him to, and if Shiro was going to stand by him each step of the way, Keith could try. For that at least, he could try.

He couldn't speak, but Shiro must have somehow realised Keith's train of thought, for his concern faded the longer Keith sat in silence. Finally, as Kendell appeared at the door and swept past them in disregarding strides to all but scoop Gabe from his seat and haul him away alongside her, Shiro half-turned and tipped his head in a gesture.

"Come on," he said. "Let's get out of here."

Keith swallowed thickly. Rising to his feet, he took his place at Shiro's side as they left Kendell's office behind them. He kept his head bowed, but any residual anger for Gabe and the fight, for being called out and blamed when Gabe was responsible - because he was being an ass and it was his fault, even if Keith had thrown the first punch - had faded. He could only glance sidelong up at Shiro when Shiro placed a hand on his shoulder and drew his attention.

"Are you okay?" he asked, eyes skimming over Keith's face in a swift assessment. "Do I need to take you to the nurse's office?"

Keith immediately shook his head.

"You're sure?"

A nod.

Shiro assessed him for a moment longer before nodding himself in reluctant acceptance. "Okay, then. But you tell me if you're not feeling up to anything, okay? I was thinking we could take a trip down to the hangar today since we haven't been since last Monday, but…"

"The hangar?" Keith raised his head in spite of himself. "You're taking me to -?"

"Sure," Shiro said with a smile.

"Now?"

"Did you have somewhere else to be?"

Keith opened and closed his mouth for a moment, struggling for words as they rounded the corner. Finally, chewing the inside of his bottom lip, he frowned. "I'm pretty sure Kendell expected you to discipline me," he said.

"I assume so," Shiro ceded, dropping his hand from Keith's shoulder to step forward and lead the way down the short flight of stairs to the ground floor. "But from the look of Gabe, I suspect it was his fault."

"Maybe," Keith muttered.

"And I don't really believe in reactionary punishment," Shiro continued, just as Keith had anticipated. He'd spoken those very words in exchange of a scolding countless times before. "Better to talk it out when everyone's cooled down a little, don't you think?"

Keith couldn't argue with that. Not when he knew very well that, after they'd 'cooled down' at the hangar and after Shiro joined him for dinner as he still did every so often even thought he wasn't a student anymore, they really would talk. Or have 'The Talk', as Keith had come to think of it with more than a little exasperation. He wasn't particularly phased by The Talk, and could almost predict what Shiro would say word for word. It wasn't like it would make him change his attitude. He wasn't the only one responsible, after all; it took two people to fight.

But maybe… maybe this time Keith might listen a little more attentively. _I_ _will never give up on you,_ Shiro had said, and it struck Keith more fiercely that day than he would have thought possible.

As Shiro continued to talk over his shoulder, chuckling to himself with a worded, "Don't think I'll forget. I'll get you when you least expect it," Keith hastened after him. He didn't know if he could stop getting into fights when it was justified, or when someone picked a fight with him. He didn't know about 'not giving up on himself', or if he even could. But he would try. If Shiro asked it of him, he would try.


	6. I'm Here

It didn't make sense. None of it did.

_I know this must be confusing for you…_

Not the fact that he was there, wherever 'there' was. Not the fact that 'there' appeared to be nothing short of open, spreading space dotted with a surplus many distant star and strewn colours as multihued as a nebula and – and –

_I'm not here to harm you. Everyone is fine…_

And Shiro. Shiro, a translucent figure planted directly before him, wearing the face Keith knew so well but wearing it better than he had but minutes before. Better than the clone, the rage-filled opponent he'd fought, the glaring foe he'd stared down.

_The thing that attacked you wasn't me…_

Keith knew that. He was so confused – about where he was, how they were there, the clones and everything that it came with it – but he knew that much. Shiro would never hurt him, just as Keith would never hurt Shiro. Despite the rage and pain that had flooded him, and despite the battle and the anger, the hatred for the clone that had taken _his Shiro_ , he wouldn't hurt him. He couldn't.

What he needed to know was where. And when. And how.

_Since my fight with Zarkon, I've been here…_

Zarkon. Shiro had fought Zarkon – Gods, it felt so long ago now. The time passing, the skewing of events, all clattered together in an tumbling collision as Keith fought to steady himself upon an interdimensional plane that shouldn't exist, to assimilate a reality that he hadn't even considered to replace what he'd unknowingly accepted. That Shiro hadn't been _his_ Shiro. Shiro hadn't been there, but even worse –

_I existed on another realm. I died, Keith…_

Keith didn't think his body was on that insubstantial plane. He could see his fingers, hear his own thoughts, but he didn't think he would be able to feel. Not until Shiro's words struck him with a blow that would have torn him apart had he had a body to do so. It hurt. It hurt so much, ripped and tore and rendered incapacitated every part of him, but all Keith could do was stare at the image of Shiro, his face soft and sad, with wide eyes.

_But the Black Lion somehow retained my essence…_

Not enough. It wasn't enough. Shiro's offer was something, but that something wasn't enough to alleviate the pain. Not even slightly.

_I tried to warn the others –_

It wasn't enough.

_But our connection wasn't strong enough…_

It hurt, and brutally thundered through Keith in a rampage of horror until he thought he would crumple inwards upon himself. But he didn't get the chance. As Shiro's words reached their climax, his final words of 'strength' and 'connection' ringing in Keith's head, that star-ridden plane of darkness and coloured light faded. All that Keith was left with was a dizzying moment of disconnect before awareness settled upon him.

A floor. A hard floor beneath him, unyielding and cold. Trembling in the throes of loss, battling the urge to cry out simply to loose the pain, to demand that it _stop_ and to rage that it _wasn't fair_ , Keith steeled himself. He swallowed the ache, bottled it within himself and stoppered the top with as much force as he could muster. Then he peeled his eyes open.

The room around him swum into tilted view reluctantly. With a deep, shuddering inhalation, hand grasping at the ground to steady himself, Keith pushed himself upright as much as he could manage. Blinking groggily, his gaze darted off the walls, the ceiling, off the panel just to his right laden with switches, familiarity welled.

 _The Black Lion,_ he thought, dragging his gaze in another sweep off the hard edges of the room. "You saved us," he murmured, fingers pressing into the metal floor. _But how…?_

A groan sounded behind him, and Keith rolled towards it. The sight of Shiro, splayed and defenceless and one arm short yet twitching with life despite his amputatiuon, dragged forth a whole wealth of raucous, desperate thoughts within him, rising to battle the words that the interdimensional Shiro had spoken to him.

_I died, Keith…_

_And yet here you are._ Keith pushed himself to his hands and knees and crawled towards Shiro. A part of him knew that the situation was dire. He knew that he had to rise, to hasten back to the paladins, because though 'Shiro' might not have killed them, they were still in danger.

But just for a moment, Keith could only pause at Shiro's side. He lowered his forehead to rest heavily atop Shiro's chest, to feel him breathe, to know he was alive. And just as he'd promised to himself, he did so again, aloud this time, to be sure that Shiro heard it this time.

"I'll never let go, Shiro."

* * *

His boots skidded as he whipped around a corner so fast he almost fell over, but Keith didn't slow. Dropping a hand to the ground to brace himself, he launched forwards instead, flying through the thin cluster of students still making their way down to and from the mess hall for dinner. The only intelligible thought that passed through his head was a single, mindless word.

_No, no, no, no, no, no…_

Shouts and squawks met Keith's barrelling charge, but he paid them no mind. He couldn't even glance over his shoulder as a sharp "Kogane, get back here!" was flung at him like a whip cracking, the familiar voice of one of his classmates abandoned in his wake. He ducked and dodged, tic-tacking off walls and around students, barely seeing them. He skidded around another corner and vaulted down a dozen steps without touching a single one of them, and the jarring impact upon his knees when he landed was left behind him as he flew onward down the corridor.

The door leading outside, the identification pad awaiting his approval – it was too great a hurdle to slow down for. Rounding the final corner, in the closing gap that nipped on the heels of a departing student, Keith took a dive and leapt through the sliver remaining. He was rolling to his feet and flying down the walkway leading from the complex an instant later, the orange radiance of the evening sun nearly blinding him, and barely slowed to dodge around those that had departed before him.

Keith's breath was coming harder than it should have. He knew, but he didn't care. He made a reckless turn to take a short cut and nearly crashed into another student who only just managed to stagger out of his way. He ducked between the narrow gap between buildings and then, when he spilled from the other side, threw himself at the looming wall that stood between the Garrison school and the pilot's quarters. A wall run, a vault over the top, and Keith was hitting the ground running once more.

Instinct told him where to look first. Instinct and hope that Shiro would really be there. Abandoning the sleeping quarters that were prohibited to all but pilots yet Shiro had long ago granted him access to, Keith darted away from the greater spread of buildings and around to the back. Even when he caught sight of the familiar shape of a Scraper, the familiar figure that stood alongside it, he didn't slow.

"You're leaving!"

The words were out of Keith's mouth before he had any idea he'd intended to speak them. As Shiro straightened from his Scraper, flicking the switch to lower the hovering bike to the ground, Keith all but screeched to a stop beside him. His breath was coming hard and fast, ragged for more than just the speed he'd hastened to Shiro's side.

Shiro didn't speak; he only smiled gently. It was a small smile, but it spoke truth of what Keith already knew. Suddenly, the chanting in his head formed into proper words.

"You're really – really going," he stuttered. Hands flopping to his sides from where he hadn't even realised he'd half raised them as fists. "You're really leaving."

"Keith," Shiro said quietly.

"You can't. You shouldn't be –"

"Keith." Spoken as a sigh this time.

"It's so – it's so - Shiro, it's for so long, it's –"

"It's not so bad, Keith." Turning, Shiro propped himself against his Scraper. "Granted, Pluto's a bit of a trip, but it's not like it hasn't been done before. It won't be quite as long as you think, and with the new Hawkers that have come in to take, I'm sure we'll be..."

Keith barely heard his reassurances. His throat convulsed, choking on his breath and stifling his ability to speak. All he could do was cling to a single thought:

_Shiro's leaving. He's going to Kerberos, and even if Hawkers are fast enough to chew up the distance to get there, it's for so, so long…_

"…just for a rudimentary check-up," Shiro was saying. "I'll be with Matt. You remember Matt, don't you? Matt Holt? I think you must have at least seen him when he was still at the Garrison too. Keith?"

Numbly, Keith jerked his head in a nod.

"Well, I'll be with Matt and his father. I'm sure it will be an interesting trip. I'm very lucky to have been given the opportunity."

Of course Shiro would think himself lucky. Other pilots who were barely five years out of the Garrison wouldn't think such a trek was anything to brush aside like an afternoon, but Shiro would. He'd think it was the best damned stroll he'd ever taken, too.

But it was dangerous. And something could happen. And he would be gone for a long, long time, longer than he'd ever been gone before, and Keith... he didn't know what to do, what to say, but he couldn't stand it. The thought of Shiro gone? Of him leaving? Even with the promise of his eventual return, it was…

 _It's not like I expected him to stay here forever,_ Keith scolded himself, but even as the thought arose, he knew it was false. Or maybe simply that, if not expected, he'd hoped for it to be. There was no one else like Shiro. Not to Keith. He wanted to be with him, to stick by his side if only to be sure he was okay, to – to –

"I want to go with you," Keith blurted out before he could help himself.

Shiro, words that Keith hadn't been listening to silenced, fell silent. His mouth still slightly open, he stared at Keith for a long moment before, sinking back a little further against his bike, he folded his arms loosely across his chest.

"You will," Shiro said. "Eventually."

"No," Keith said shortly. "I want to go with you for this one."

"Keith."

"It's too long. And too far. And it's dangerous."

"Keith, you –"

"And why shouldn't I go?" Keith knew his voice was rising, had grown fierce with anger he couldn't suppress and couldn't understand the nature of but let lose nonetheless. "Greene thinks I'm good enough to fly myself. He let me go over to Nandoe by myself only last week, and that took a whole hour."

" _Keith_ –"

"It's not like I can't do it, Shiro. I'm not incapable. I can do this _._ "

Shiro shook his head slightly. "I never thought you were incapable. You're just too young right now to –"

"I'm not a kid, Shiro." Keith realised he was shouting, but he didn't care. "I'm not a kid, and I'm not useless!"

How he ended up in a hug, Keith wasn't sure. He couldn't even recall the exact moment Shiro had pushed himself from his Scraper and wrapped his arms around him. That he'd squeezed his eyes shut, had dropped his chin, had curled his fists and hunched his shoulders, seemed only half the reason for that.

Keith realised he was shaking. Not with tears, though his eyes burned with something not far off, but with the ferocity with which he struggled to withhold further shouts as they threatened to tumble forth. His face pressed against Shiro's shoulder, awkward and too hot in the evening heat, and yet it was enough to render Keith keenly and painfully muted with sheer longing for it. If Shiro was hugging him, a hug he'd never done before, then he was close. Keith could see him. It meant he was safe, and he wasn't far away or leaving. It meant that Keith was still afloat, his head still above water.

If Shiro left…

"Take me too," Keith croaked into Shiro's shoulder. "Please." It was all he could manage, all he let himself manage, because to say more – _I don't want to be left behind, I don't want to be alone, I don't want to have to have everything change again, and again, and again –_ was too much.

Shiro sighed heavily. Keith felt it where his face was muffled against him as much as he heard it. He felt the regret too in the way Shiro raised a hand to the back of Keith's head, scuffing his hair gently but with a definitiveness that Keith hated.

"You'll come with me, Keith," he murmured, almost too low for Keith to hear him. His arms were heavy around him, too warm but present enough that such warmth didn't matter. "When you're old enough, you will. But not yet."

It wasn't enough. Not for Keith. But all at once it seemed too much effort to argue, too impossible. Shiro's words seemed far too inevitable.

Squeezing his eyes closed, biting his lip so fiercely he tasted the stinging bitterness of blood, Keith raise a hand to latch onto Shiro's shirt. He hooked his arms around Shiro's back in return and clung on to him for dear life. A part of him hoped that, if he held on tightly enough, he'd never have to let go.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A/N: So - update! Finally! I feel like I'm being so slow with these updates and I'm really, really sorry about that. I hope you enjoyed the chapter and I'll update the next as soon as I can. Please leave a comment if you get the chance because I love hearing your thoughts. Thank you to the lovely people who have done so already; you're absolutely wonderful.


	7. A Promise

Stories always spoke of the heroes. The travellers, the explorers, the trials faced, and challenges overcome. They spoke of ragged winters with only the company of their comrades, of death-defying feats and the relief of success and coming out the other side. They spoke of the ending of journeys and the final moments before faces turned homeward and feet trudged back to loved ones left behind.

History books, biographies, fictional stories – they all spoke of those who left to fulfil their duties, as though preparing the reader or watcher or listener for their own journey. So rarely did they ever speak of those left behind.

The view from the Garrison was spectacular in the evening. The sun sinking below the distant horizon, darkening the planes and ragged, distant peaks from orange to brown and finally deepening to muddy smears. It was spectacular – and it was utterly empty. There were no incoming ships. There were no returning pilots, no fleets cruising home after a dangerous mission. There was no pinpoint of shadow upon that horizon in the shape of an aircraft, limping with engines blown and crew exhausted yet an explanation as to why they were delayed, where they'd been, how it was that they'd taken so long to return on the tips of their tongues.

The Kerberos mission was late. It was far too late, and Keith seemed to be the only one who cared. No one listened. No one seemed concerned for the absence of Shiro and his crew or, if they were concerned, it wasn't enough. Not enough to send a rescue mission to Kerberos. Not enough to send back up, or a scout, or – or anyone to ensure that they were alright. No contact for weeks, no whisper of where they'd disappeared to, and nothing? No one had been sent?

Keith didn't know for sure. Of course he didn't; he hardly had the authority, the _privilege,_ to bear witness to the discussions pertaining to expeditions. He hadn't heard specifically that a rescue mission had been denied, or that no one cared.

But he wasn't stupid. Keith watched and he saw. What he saw was a lack of urgency, a lack of care, a disregard whenever he approached a captain or a general, or demanded of the Garrison superiors that they do something, anything. He'd offered himself up to go and see, would fly solo, and he knew he was good enough. He was a good flier, and not only because his supposed 'natural talents'. He was good because Shiro had taught him. He was good because he'd trained alongside the best.

But nothing. No one responded. And when Keith had snapped, demanding a response, demanded _something_ , he'd been forcibly removed from the company of his superiors.

"Watch it, kid," the commander warned him as he was hauled out of the room. "I've heard about you and your behavioural issues. One step too far and I'll have no hesitation in kicking you out of the program. Mark my words I will; not even child prodigies are immune to the rules."

Keith glared at the commander where he sat behind his wide, cluttered desk, his face hard and expression unwavering, and so, so foolish because he didn't see. He didn't realise that there was so much that was wrong, so much that silence could and often did suggest, and that something had to be done about it. But before Keith could utter another word, before he could do more than bare his teeth like a caged wolf, he was dragged from the room by the commander's lackies.

That had been barely hours before. Just hours, and in those hours Keith had done little more than pace across the stunted breadth of his assigned room with prowling steps, fists clenched and shoulders so tense that they had begun to ache. _Do something. You have to do something, do something, do_ something…

Somehow, after a time, his chanting seemed less a demand of the Garrison superiors and more an order to himself. _If no one else will do anything, then I'll have to do it myself._

To hell with the Garrison. To hell with the rules, the regulation, the demands and the provisions. Keith didn't need it, hadn't wanted it, and had only attended the school in the first place because he had nothing else for himself. Because he'd been told to. He hadn't a life to step into when he grew too old for the foster home, and so the carers at the home had leapt upon the admission offer with unconcealed delight.

Keith hadn't been the one to want it, even if he enjoyed flying. It wasn't worth it. Just as it wasn't worth sticking around a bunch of unreliable, resistant bastards who didn't respond to urgency with anything even approaching rationality and logic. Keith had attended the Garrison for one reason, but he'd stayed for another entirely. And that reason, the reason he'd stuck to it for so long… What was the point in remaining if Shiro wasn't there to make him stay?

 _Just the two of us,_ Shiro had said.

 _We're in this together, you and I,_ he'd said with a smile.

 _We'll make a great team someday,_ he'd promised. _Just as soon as you finish up with school._

Pausing mid step, Keith glanced towards his door. _As soon as you finish up._ Shiro hadn't said graduate. Not that time. And even knowing that it was underhanded of him, Keith would take hold of that oversight with both hands.

His room was small and uncluttered. Living out of little more than a single bag his whole life, a box-like trunk at the home and a cupboard just as small in the Garrison, there wasn't much for him to stow away. Slinging the standard issue pack onto his bed, Keith made short work of stuffing a handful of clothes inside. A wallet of minimal cash, also issued by the Garrison as a charity case. A bottle of water. A handful of MER bars that were little more than calorie-rich blocks of tasteless cardboard used as emergency rations for soldiers and pilots. It would be enough. Enough to get Keith out of the confining, claustrophobic walls of the Garrison and its fools for leaders.

That was it. That – and a pair of keys that he rarely took from his pocket.

Shucking his jacket on and tugging on his boots, his gloves, looping his single scarf around his neck, Keith slung his pack over his shoulder. He glanced briefly at the flashing digits on the wall clock, an echo of the announcements that regularly sounded throughout the Garrison to order students and pilots into action, to follow schedules and rosters like the good little subordinates they were. Keith scowled at those digits accusingly, as though they were to blame. When he shouldered the door of his room open, he paused just long enough to shift his scowl to the ID pad on the wall inside and, with a punch of numbers as instinctive as it was educated, he dismantled it and erased his name tagged to the room.

Behavioural issues. Ha. He supposed he might have a few of those.

No one stopped him as he strode through the Garrison. It was late enough that most of the pilots and trainees would either be at the mess hall or the common rooms if they hadn't already sought the privacy of their rooms. Not that anyone would care if they did notice Keith. No one had ever cared except Shiro.

 _Just as no one cares that he's gone_.

Keith glared at the ground beneath his feet. His anger all but shook him as it trembled down his spine, and he clenched the strap of his pack mercilessly tightly. If no one cared that Shiro was gone, then he would just have to do something about it himself.

Breaking into a run, springing onto his toes and leaving barely the faintest tap of footsteps behind him, Keith picked up his pace and swept through the hallways. He dodged around corners, took each and every shortcut he knew by heart, and descended stairwells by leaping over railing more than he used the steps. Those scarce few passers-by he encountered on his way didn't slow him or request that he pause for questioning; students and pilots alike, no one cared. No one ever did.

Bursting from the back door, an all but abandoned route that Keith had long ago discovered was rarely if ever locked, he didn't slow as he tore across the shadowed grounds. He didn't pause as he darted around the buildings and ducked beneath the sights of the guards that pointlessly, worthlessly stood on duty, because they didn't _do_ anything. They weren't cluey enough to acknowledge that the absence of a returning vehicle was as much a cause for concern as the presence of them.

The holding garage was off limits. Or it was supposed to be. Shiro had access to them, however, and by proxy Keith did too. Slipping into the deeper shadows of the garage door, Keith ran his fingers over the keypad almost reflexively, swiping the microchipped tags across the scanner as he did so. A muted beep acknowledged him favourably, and he slipped through the doors as they slid open a moment later.

Most of the vehicles within were negligible. They weren't worth his attention. Even more than that, they weren't worth his time. Keith didn't know what time he was striving to beat, but he knew that it was of the essence. The Garrison ultimately didn't care about him, for regardless of how good a pilot he was, he would be replaced by the next able-bodied kid to step up to the line. They didn't care enough to drag him back and instil some sense of commitment into what Shiro had always called his 'rebellious nature' – but they would set an example of him. People were kicked out of the Garrison; no one left because they wanted to.

Shiro's bike was planted in the corner, wedged behind a handful of other hovercrafts and less polished bikes. Nudging them aside, Keith flicked the bike to life and, with barely a coaxing nudge, urged it to follow after him as he wove his way towards the garage doors. And maybe he did kick those doors open with needless aggression. Maybe he did deliberately bump into just a few of those silent crafts parked around him as though he had a personal grudge against them. And maybe, just maybe, when he slung his leg over Shiro's bike and gunned it to smoothly humming life, he threw it into gear and sprang away from those doors without closing them properly.

The view from the Garrison was incredible, in a way. It provided an open view of the sky, untouched and seamlessly exposed – and that was its very problem. It was too perfect, too empty, and that was what made it wrong.

Keith spared little more than a passing glance for the sky overhead as he flew away from the Garrison. He'd spent long enough staring as it was, and though a part of him desperately wanted to do little more than stare upwards, holding out hope for the Kerberos mission's return, a bigger part knew it wasn't going to happen.

He didn't know where he was going, but it didn't matter. Light faded around him, swathing him in muffled shadows, but it didn't matter either. Keith trusted his instincts and the reflexive twists and turns his body adopted in response to the flickers of precaution the bike offered him as it soared over pitfalls and pointed, rocky disasters alike. He didn't glance back at the Garrison, at the place that had been his home for nearly seven years. Not once.

After all, what was home if the person who made it so was no longer there?

* * *

The planet they'd landed upon was unremarkable – or at least it was to Keith. But then, he supposed that he would have found little interest in just about any planet they'd landed upon. It could have been a diamond-rich dragon's nest of jewels and gold, a banquet set up and overflowing with steaming floods, a spread of friendly faces and welcoming arms, or worshipping masses that demanded the attention of Voltron's paladins –

But Keith wouldn't have noticed. He had little attention for anything but Shiro as he lowered him gently to the smooth, dusty ground. His hand cradled the back of Shiro's head, and even when he rested him completely he couldn't bring himself to remove that hand. Shiro looked so defenceless, utterly limp in his unconsciousness, face lax but for the touch of a frown on his brow and the hint of pain tightening his mouth. Grazes and bruises, as much a product of their fight as the collapse of the hangar they'd been in, speckled his cheeks and chin and forehead.

Keith couldn't just let go of him. Not in the face of that. Not when, despite it all, despite his size and the confident presence he'd always possessed, Shiro seemed somehow so small.

He wasn't gone. That much Keith had to remind himself. _He's not gone_. In the company of the other paladins, in the aftermath of their battle against Lotor, in the hollow absence of the Castle of Lions that weighed so heavily upon them all and strung just as with as much exhaustion, it was all that kept Keith afloat. That Shiro had spoken to him, helped him, coaxed him into level-headed patience in the moment he needed it.

_Patience yields focus._

He'd always said that. It was something of a mantra to Shirol. And somehow, even outside of the heat of urgent battle and thrumming adrenaline, Keith clung to that induced patience, and the focus it yielded afforded him enough composure to hold himself together. It was the only way, in the circling company of the paladins, he could steel himself to speak.

"This body is barely living.. but Shiro's spirit is alive." Detached. It was the only way Keith could speak such things. "It's inside the Black Lion. I heard him talking to me."

"He… he tried to tell me," Lance choked out behind him. Amidst the cluster of paladins, their faces torn with fear and grief as much for Shiro himself as for the heartbreaking loss of the castle, he was the only one who managed to speak. "But I didn't realise."

Keith couldn't look away from Shiro long enough to glance Lance's way even if he wanted to offer a word of consolation, but he saw when Lance moved. Breath hitching, he collapsed to his knees on Shiro's other side. His shoulders hunched, his hands clutching the ground as tears visibly welled and guilt contorted his features.

"I'm so sorry, Shiro," Lance stuttered, squeezing his eyes closed. "I – I didn't know. I could've…" The tears spilled forth. Lance had always been an emotional person, Keith knew, whether that emotion was joy, or anger, or fierce satisfaction. He felt things strongly, and it poured from his shoulders as Keith didn't let it from himself.

His shoulders were shaking, Keith realised, and a part of him knew that, as the paladin of the Black Lion in Shiro's absence, he should do something about it. He should say something. But before he could even attempt awkward comfort, Allura, on her knees beside Lance, reached a hand towards him. Keith watched only from his periphery, saw her hand squeeze, her attempted smile even with her own grief so profound, her eyes shiny with tears.

But she didn't say anything. She didn't speak as, with a brief pause to close her eyes, she rose to her feet. She turned. She strode deliberately towards the Black Lion, not quite confident but steady in her steps. As one, the paladins, even Keith, couldn't help but watch her approach the lion and plant herself before it. Her hands rose and, with a gentleness that bellied the hulking size of the lion, placed her fingers upon its lowered snout.

She looked so small. So small yet so strong, and in spite of himself, it wasn't Shiro's words urging him towards _patience_ and _focus_ that seized Keith with hope. It was Allura, her back straight and stance firm as she reached for the lion as though she truly knew what she was doing. Perhaps she did.

No words were exchanged. No pleas were uttered, no coaxing call to Shiro or the Black Lion as Keith might have expected. Allura didn't say anything; she simply bowed her head and, with barely a beat of a breathless pause, light erupted from her fingers at the point of contact upon the lion's snout.

It spread. Like a river flowing into creases and crevasses, a network infiltrating a system, it spread across the Black Lion's enormous face with tiny channels of light. White and pink, glowing and almost too bright to watch, the pooling energy coursed through and pulsed from Allura's hands. But that flow, that energy - it didn't spread into the lion. With a flash of brightness that flared the lion's flat gaze from yellow to blinding white, those channels erupted along every inch of connection, every conjoined edge of metal, and flowed towards her. Like water drawn through the root system of a tree, it filtered into Allura's hands, infusing her until she was glowing even brighter than the lion had itself.

Keith stared. He stared at the light pulsed through her, illuminating her from within. He stared as tendrils of light like floating particles of ash fizzled around her before dissipating. He stared with eyes wide and maybe just a little desperate as she turned, thrumming with visible energy, and opened her eyes with a glance back towards them. Back towards Shiro. It was eerie, that her eyes flared as brightly and luminescent as had the Black Lion's, yet somehow Keith felt his chest tighten, swelling with mounting hope.

When Allura returned to Shiro's side, lowering herself back to her knees as she dropped her glowing hands to his head, Keith's breath caught. His hand curled where it still cradled Shiro's head. _Patience yields focus_ , Shiro had told him again and again. Why was it so hard to be patient?

It was magical. Magical was the only word that could describe the vibrant exchange of energy that flooded from Allura's hands into where she gently placed her palms on either side of Shiro's head. Keith might have once explained it away as alien science – but no, it was magic. Just as it was magic that flooded Shiro with light, magic that rose from him in tiny, firefly flickers like emitted spores. The very air seemed to thrum with it, and then Shiro himself as the white light faded from Allura's eyes and abandoned her completely.

It remained in a cocoon around Shiro for only a little longer. A cluster of seconds longer, and Keith wasn't sure whether it was desperation or breathlessness that had him gasping silently, composure momentarily shattered. It shattered again, froze him into stillness, when that light completely faded to abandon Shiro into limp unconsciousness once more.

He was asleep. He was seemingly unawakened. Unchanged but for a head of pale white hair that stood as testimony to the fierce battle he'd fought, the stress that had nearly torn him apart, the disastrous tragedy that had ripped his soul from his body.

No one spoke. No one moved. The moment seemed to hang in suspended terror as Keith stared at Shiro and willed his broken body back to life. It might have once been a clone, but this Shiro… this soul…

_Please, please, please -  
_

Shiro eyes snapped open and Keith nearly choked. Blinding whiteness, a reflection of that which had infused Allura, flared within them, only to vanish just as quickly. Keith stared, breath catching, and silently begged for the familiarity of the gaze that he knew so well. No alien light, no malice that Shiro had never held, no hatred or ferocity or… or…

Shiro lurched upright, breath gasping as though he'd only just paused in the fierce battle that they'd shared just hours before. Only for a second before, with a catch of his own breath, he slumped into Keith. As though he knew he was there. As though he knew that Keith would be ready and waiting to catch him, just in case.

He was. Keith would always be there. He'd promised.

The Black Lion roared. Its fellows tipped their heads back and joined it instantly. Fierce delight, a victory realised, vibrated through the air, through the ground, and relief unlike any Keith had felt in what could only be loosely deemed a triumph in the fight against Lotor thrummed through him.

Romelle screamed at the eruption, but it wasn't quite in fear, and Krolia flinched at her side.

Coran and Hunk bellowed in sobbing exclamations before Coran flung himself at Hunk in a joyous hug.

Pidge wiped surreptitiously at her eye, but she didn't even attempt to hide her smile.

Lance seemed to sag in place, couldn't look away from Shiro, and Allura briefly closed her eyes with a sigh of relief.

And Keith –

"You found me."

Holding Shiro against him, Keith dropped his gaze back towards him. He thought he might have been smiling, but he wasn't sure. He thought that Allura probably was too as she shifted her own attention back towards him, but he didn't glance up to check.

"We're glad you're back, Shiro," Keith murmured. The words were so inadequate, but it didn't matter. He meant it. He meant it with all of his heart, and it didn't matter what challenges they would face with what was to follow.

Was the universe safe now that Lotor was gone? Keith didn't know.

Would the Alteans be relieved for the freedom they hadn't even known they'd been denied? He didn't know that either and would have to leave such speculations up to Allura.

What would they be with Lotor gone? What would they do? Voltron would always be needed, Keith knew, but for what he had no idea. And without the castle there were few enough places left to go.

But it didn't matter. Just for a moment, his inadequate words encompassed Keith entirely and he could only hope that his hold around Shiro's arms told him just how much he meant it.

 _I'm glad you're back, Shiro. I promise, I'll never let you leave again._ It was a foolish promise, perhaps, but one Keith intended to keep with everything he could.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A/N: All finished! Thank you to everyone who's stuck with me this far; I appreciate it more than you can imagine.   
> Thanks for reading. I'd love to know your thoughts if you have a chance to comment, about the fic, season 6 or speculations about future seasons. Don't be shy to drop by!

**Author's Note:**

> A/N: Hi everyone! Hope you enjoyed the first chapter. I've already got the second one nearly ready to post with just a couple of edits to do, so should hopefully have it up soon provided real life doesn't get in the way.  
> I'd love to hear your thoughts on the story so far! Each and every comment, no matter how small, means so much to me. Thanks to reading!


End file.
